The Project Gutenberg eBook of Revolt on Io

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Title: Revolt on Io

Author: Nelson S. Bond

Illustrator: Don Lynch

Release date: April 17, 2020 [eBook #61858]

Most recently updated: October 17, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/61858

Credits: Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online

Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK REVOLT ON IO ***

REVOLT ON IO

By NELSON BOND

Death stalked the Libra. The

Io-plunging space liner freighted a

secret weapon, and the rebel Kreuther

had vowed it should not arrive.

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from

Planet Stories Spring 1941.

Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that

the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

The ship's clock bonged drowsily three times. Bud Chandler, the junior watch, glared at it languidly. "Thus," he yawned, "endeth the lobster patrol. Three bells, my fine bucko—and the soft, warm hay for you. Or—" There was a hopeful note in his voice. "Or would you like to finish out my trick for me? I'll stand double for you some night."

Dan Mallory said, "Comets to you, sailor!" And he rose, stretching the kinks out of weary muscles. His collar was open at the throat, his back ached from five solid hours in the bucket-shaped control chair. His eyes were strained. That was from peering alternately at glowing panels, through a perilens plate into the murky, blue-black space before the void-hurtling Libra, and back to the panels again. "There's a little thing called sleep which I'm going to grab some of. As soon as Norton shows up. Where the pink Cepheids—?"

"Tell you what. Finish my trick tonight, Dan, and I'll double for you twice. That's fair enough, isn't it?"

"Fair enough," said Mallory, "but not sufficiently enticing. Like an albino on a desert planetoid. Ah, here's our hero now! Welcome, Sir Relief! Dump it into the basket and let poppa go seek the arms of Morpheus."

"Who's she?" growled Rick Norton, Third Mate. His eyes were puffy; he squinted and glared at the bright lights of the control turret. "Hell's howling acres, I'm tired! I just about got to sleep when—Oh, well. Log in order?"

"Directly." Mallory shot a curious glance at Norton. "Just got to sleep? How come? What were you doing up so late?"

"It wasn't official business," answered the junior officer curtly, "so it's none of yours. Let's have your log sheet." He slumped into the control chair, squinted through the perilens and made a few tiny course corrections. Across the room, Bud Chandler's shoulders shrugged a reply to Dan's swift lift of the eyebrows. The Second Mate's lips formed a word. "Sore-head!" Mallory nodded. Norton was a surly son-of-a-spacewrangler.

But that wasn't any skin off his nose. He went to the chart table. Footsteps clattered up the Jacob's ladder, the door flew open and the Old Man stomped onto the bridge. He snapped, "'Zuwere!" and glowered over Mallory's shoulder, shrewd, space-faded eyes reading sense into the senior lieutenant's neat, precise columns. He jabbed a horny finger at one line of figures. "Sure o' that, Mallory? Velocity that high?"

Mallory said respectfully, "Yes, sir. All figures have been checked and double checked. We're point oh-oh-one on course. Forced speed, point thirty-nine above normal."

"Checked and double checked," said Captain Algase, "is good enough most of the time. But this trip is special. And vitally important. Forty thousand innocent lives depend on our reaching Io damn soon! Remember that, Mallory. All of you remember that."

The stern lines of his face eased a trifle. "It's been a hard shuttle, I know. A brutal, punishing trip. And we've all been under a terrific strain. But our difficulties are nothing compared to those of the garrison and the honest colonists of New Fresno. They're looking to us for aid, and we're bringing them aid.

"That is, someone aboard this ship is. I honestly don't know who that person is. No one knows except the man himself, the commander of the SSP Intelligence Department on Earth, and maybe someone at New Fresno. But he is on board, either an officer, sailor or passenger, and he is carrying to Io the plans for the new ray weapon recently perfected by the SSP Ordnance Bureau.

"Those plans will enable our New Fresno garrison to subdue this mysterious uprising on Io. That's why the Libra is traveling at forced speed. That's why we must redouble every normal precaution to insure our reaching the Io colony. That's why, too, we must keep our eyes open; watch even each other. What's the matter with you, Norton?"

Norton had started suddenly. Now he muttered, red-faced, "Sorry, sir. Sudden light in the visiplate. It looked like a meteoride."

"There's nothing there now," said the skipper.

But Chandler repeated, "Watch each other, Captain? I don't get it. We're all pledged and trusted members of the Solar Space Patrol, aren't we? We all live by the SSP motto. I don't see—" He fingered his breast insignia, that tiny, golden rocket emblazoned with the words, Order out of Chaos. "I don't see why we should—"

"Because," explained the skipper grimly, "wherever there's an uprising there are converts to the new cause, traitors to the old. Where there are plans, there are spies to steal them. That's not a warning from H.Q.; that's plain, old-fashioned horse-sense. I fought through the Rollie Rebellion, you know. After the Grantland massacre I discovered that one of my own messmates was in the pay of the Mercurians.

"I won't say for sure that there is a spy aboard the Libra. But if there is, we must give him no opportunity to learn anything. Weary or not, we must remain on the alert at all times. But I needn't say any more. Finished, Mallory?"

"Yes, sir. Log in order, sir."

"Very good. You may retire. Chandler, you seem to be fagged."

Bud said, "One more yawn and I'll be a zombie."

"A gabby zombie?" sniffed the Old Man. "I'll finish your trick for you. Go get some rest." Still glowering, he plumped himself into the seat vacated by Chandler, cut in the intercommunications board, audioed the radio turret. "Is that you, Sparks? Wake up, you lazy scut! Any news from the Earth? Or Mars Central?"

The radioman's voice clacked metallically, "No, sir. I can't get through to any station. The rebel forces at New Fresno are still jamming the ether with static interference on all wave bands."

"Well, keep trying. Let me know if you get through. Well?" The skipper glanced back over his shoulder. "Well, I thought you two were tired? What are you waiting for? Want to stand another trick apiece?"

"No, sir!" said both men hastily. "We're leaving, sir!" They fled.

"Ain't he a whipper, though?" asked Chandler affectionately. "He growls like a terrier pup, but he's got no more bite than a cup custard. 'Scuse me!" A gigantic yawn split his grin in two. "Must have been something I et!"

"The hell of it is," said Mallory ruefully, "now I'm off duty, I'm not a bit tired. I wasn't tired at all, really. Just had hardening of the panties from squatting in that seat so long. Got a cigarette?"

Chandler tossed him a package. "And don't swipe the coupon, either. Six thousand more and I get an electronic microscope. Well, you can do what you like. I'm going bye-bye and try to forget the waffles that bucket-seat has pressed into my hip pockets. 'Night, pal!"

His footsteps rang sharp little echoes on the metal flooring, echoes that hollowed as he disappeared down a corridor leading to the sleeping quarters and Mallory turned toward the observation deck.

The tall First Mate leaned against the heavy quartzite pane staring into the depths of space through which the Libra scudded. The sight was no novelty to him, but as ever it wakened in his heart a sense of awe, a feeling of weird instability, a sort of pride in Man that he, of all the many, strange life-forms experimenting nature had devised, should so far be the only one whose imagination was so great, whose curiosity was so strong, that he had found a way to fling himself at blinding speed across the broad, unfathomable reaches of the void.

It was disheartening to realize that even though he had attained the stars, Man had not yet sloughed off the instincts and habits of the ape from which he sprang. Man's genius had blazed a path across the spaceways, Man's bravery had established new colonies from scorching Mercury to frozen Uranus. SSP lightships bridged the chasms between and beyond; even now the concentrated rays of faraway Sol were steaming the rimy crust off Pluto that Earth's miners might extract the valuable ores revealed by the spectroscope. But with the growth of the colonies, Man's ever latent cupidity had come into play. This past half century, thought Dan Mallory with a sort of savage anger, had been nothing but one long, bloody era of warfare between the forces of law and the outlawry of the greedy.

Now there was this uprising on the first satellite of Jupiter; Io. A charming little world. A pleasant Earth-like orb, spinning quietly about its gigantic parent. Up to this time, its natives had never been troublesome. Squat, muscular creatures, more or less anthropoid, except for the fact that their complexions had a pale, greenish cast and their eyes were double-lidded like those of snakes. They had an intelligence of .63 on the Solar Constant scale. Within a century or so the control board meant to award them autonomy; toward this end educators had been working ever since Io had been removed from the British Imperial Protectorate in 2221.

Trouble had sprung, both literally and figuratively, like a bolt from the blue. A cosmic blitzkrieg. One moment there had been peace and sweet content on Io; the next came a frantic, garbled message about "a rebel army ... natives ... led by...." The rest had been drowned in an ear-drum blasting burst of electronic static that had rendered all further communication impossible.

"Kreuther!" said Mallory thoughtfully. The affair sounded like one of Kreuther's moves. That power-mad genius, exiled from Earth after the thwarted Lunar Campaign of 2234, was accustomed to strike in just this fashion. He alone, of all avowed SSP enemies, had the persuasive ability to win to his cause a horde of normally contented Ionians, the wealth with which to set into motion war's red machinery, the genius with which to disrupt interplanetary communications.

"But if it is Kreuther," thought Mallory consolingly, "this time he's bitten off more than he can chew. That new weapon—" He wondered, briefly, which officer, sailor, passenger, had been entrusted with the secret of the new ray gun's construction. Then he cast the thought from his mind. It was none of his business. It were better he didn't know.

It was at that stage of his reverie that a sudden byplay of movement captured his attention. In an instant he had cupped his cigarette into his palm, stepped into a dark patch of shadow. A figure had glided from the passageway that led to the sleeping quarters, was now peering uncertainly into the observation deck. It was David Wilmot, one of the six passengers aboard the Libra.

Wilmot's thin face was pinched with nervousness; he coughed, a thin little hacking sound in the muted quiet, then put the back of his hand to his mouth. Dan stood motionless, his dark uniform blending perfectly with the drapes that concealed him. As he waited, watching, the door at the far end of the deck opened, a short, plump man in night-robe entered. Wilmot sprang forward eagerly. His whisper carried to Dan's keen ears. "Have you got them, Doctor?"

"Quiet, you fool!" Dr. Bonetti's forehead creased angrily; his eyeglasses reflected a subdued light owlishly. He fumbled in his pocket, passed something white to the other man. "Here! But not a word, about this, mind you!"

"I know. I know." Wilmot seized the papers avidly, turned and fled down the corridor whence he had emerged. The doctor stared after him for a moment, shook his head regretfully, then disappeared. The door closed behind him softly.

"That's why, too, we must keep our eyes open—."

The skipper's words echoed in Dan Mallory's memory as he stepped from his hiding place, brow furrowed. What the devil was going on here? Could Bonetti have been the bearer of the secret plans; could Wilmot have been the spy? Had he just witnessed the sell-out of a traitor?

But before he could get his jumbled thoughts into order, a voice addressed him from behind, gravely, quietly.

"Rather confusing, eh, Lieutenant?"

Dan whirled to look into the face of Garland Smith, another of the Libra's passengers. He said, half pettishly, "You, Captain? What are you doing up at this time of night?"

The one-time officer of the SSP, now on the retired list, shot a swift glance at the glittering panorama visible through the quartzite plates.

"Night, Lieutenant? Night and day are nothing but quirks of speech out here, sleep a matter of habit. When you have lifted gravs as many years as I have—" He sighed. "I was restless. And perhaps it is just as well. I witnessed the same thing you did. And strange things are going on aboard the Libra."

Mallory said cautiously, "Perhaps you're too apprehensive, Captain. Just because two passengers are sleepless like yourself, meet in the observation chamber—"

"They're not the only two who are still awake. The whole slumbering ship stirs with movement, my boy. A moment or so before you arrived I saw Albert Lemming stealing down the No. 2 corridor—and 'stealing' is the only word that describes his progress. Before that, Mrs. Wilmot had a secret rendezvous with some one in the smoking room; I don't know who her companion was. And Lady Alice has not been in her cabin all night."

The older man's eyes sought Mallory's, his gaze was piercing.

"My boy, I realize that I no longer rank you. But not so long ago, I was your senior. Once a Patrolman, always a Patrolman, you know. I feel we are in the midst of an intrigue too weighty for one man to solve. Perhaps the experience of an old officer may help. Tell me, is it true what I have heard? That someone aboard this vessel is carrying to the New Fresno garrison the secret of Earth's new ray weapon? If so, the mysterious actions we've witnessed may be espionage, agents of the Kreuther forces—"

Mallory said respectfully, "I'm very sorry, sir. I am not permitted to say anything. But I would suggest that in the morning you speak to Captain Algase. I'm sure he'll welcome your offer of assistance." His face clouded. Slowly he said, "Lady Alice. Where did you see her last?"

"In the reading room."

Mallory saluted, turned and went to the ship's library. As he walked he found himself hoping, why, he did not try to explain to himself, that he would find the room empty. But it was not. A single lamp was lighted inside. As Mallory pressed open the door, shadows danced on the farther wall; the wavering, unidimensional symbol of an upright figure spun and made swift, jabbing motions, dropped. There was a sound of paper rustling, the rough scrape of calfskin on buckram. Then he was in the room, and Lady Alice was seated beside the refectory table, ostensibly reading a book. She glanced up with a little movement of surprise.

"Why, Lieutenant, what a pleasant surprise!"

Mallory stifled the impulse to say, "Pleasant?" He stared at the girl curiously, reminding himself for the hundredth time since she had come aboard this ship, six days ago, that as man and woman they had no common meeting ground, they lived on planes inordinately diverse. He was Dan Mallory, a Lieutenant of the Solar Space Patrol, a respectable, if underpaid, watchdog of law and order in man's widening circle of influence. Moreover, he was a young lieutenant. It would be years before he earned a major brevet, became an acceptable social figure. Even if a miracle were to happen, if he were to be selected into the envied corps of Lensmen, he would only be a super-cop. While she....

She was Lady Alice Charwell, possessor of a name and title respected for more than eight hundred years. Of course the title was now one of courtesy only; there was no Duchy of Io since the cession of that satellite to the World Council. But once her father had been manor lord of the entire globe; in the Almanach de Gotha her family name and crest still figured prominently.

All of which had little to do with the fact that her eyes were blue as the morning mists of Venus, that her limbs were white and straight and supple, softly feminine despite the mannish slack and shirt ensemble she affected, that her hair was a seine of sunlight gold that snared Dan Mallory's heart and quickened his breath.

He forced his voice to calmness. He said, "Lady Alice, don't you think it would be better if you were to go to bed? This—this staying up at night—"

Her laughter was warm and delicious.

"But, Lieutenant! Surely there's no harm in my reading myself to sleep?"

"Not a bit," agreed Mallory. He bit his lip. "I might suggest, though, that unless you're reading a book in the Lower Venusian language, it would be easier to read if the book were right side up. And—" He walked past her, swiftly, stared at the book which, hastily thrust back into the bookcase, still jutted out beyond its fellows. "And you might find more interesting reading matter than a tactical survey of Ionian military resources."

The girl's face was scarlet. She came to her feet indignantly. "Really, Lieutenant, you go too far! I don't see that it is any of your business."

"Lady Alice," said Mallory pleadingly, "a state of war exists on Io. Strange things are happening aboard the Libra, things the exact nature of which I am not at liberty to explain. If you will try to forget, for a moment, that I am a space officer—just think of me as a man—will you allow me to make the suggestion that you do absolutely nothing to lay your actions, your motives, open to any sort of suspicion?

"I realize that as one who inherited a claim to the title, 'Duchess of Io,' you are deeply interested in current affairs on that colony. Others may read another meaning into your actions, though. At least one person has already hinted that you—"

Lady Alice's breathing was swift. "Who?" she demanded. "Who is this person?"

"I'm sorry. I can't say. But will you do as I suggest?"

There was a moment of silence. Then the girl shut the book on her lap, laid it on the table, rose. "Very well, Lieutenant. I'm a rather poor deceiver, aren't I? Nevertheless, I thank you for your well-meant advice." She moved toward the doorway, grace and poise in her every stride. And she turned there to smile back at him, her voice soft and unamused. "Lieutenant," she said, "you should lay aside your shoulder-straps more often. The man beneath is most—interesting."

Then she was gone, leaving behind her a red-faced, speechless, utterly chaotic Dan Mallory.

At breakfast, Mallory presided at the head of the table. Bud Chandler, arriving a few minutes late, stared at his comrade surprisedly.

"Why, Skipper!" he said, "What this trip is doing for your complexion! You look thirty years younger. Where did you get them pretty pink cheeks?"

Mallory growled, "Sit down, pal, and shut up. The Old Man's grabbing forty, and he deserves 'em. He and Norton ran into a loft-bound vacuole last night, had a hell of a time pulling out. Didn't you hear the commotion?"

"All I heard," complained Bud, "was somebody in my room snoring. It woke me up once, and what made me maddest was when I found out it was me." He nodded to the assembled passengers, sat down and made wry faces over his grapefruit juice.

Albert Lemming, the swarthy-skinned jewel merchant en route to his company's headquarters in New Fresno, stared at the acting-Captain curiously.

"A vacuole, Lieutenant? What's that?"

"A hole in space. Something like an air-pocket in the ether. They aren't particularly dangerous, but the one we ran into was whirling in the wrong direction; if Captain Algase hadn't pulled us out, we'd have lost time on our trip to Io."

Mrs. Wilmot looked up. She was not, thought Mallory, a bad looking dame—if you went for that sharp, peaked sort of beauty. But there was a touch of cruelty to the cut of her lips, a pinched look about the nostrils, he didn't go for. And her eyes were too close together. She said, "That would be unfortunate, wouldn't it, Lieutenant? Losing time, I mean?"

There was a touch of some subtler meaning behind her words; Mallory couldn't decide just what it was. Maybe it was sarcasm, maybe it was fear, maybe it was mockery. He said, "I think we all share the desire to reach New Fresno as soon as possible, don't we?"

Her answer was unexpectedly sharp.

"I don't care if we never reach there. I'd rather die peacefully in space than—"

"Susan!" Her husband's voice sheared the end of the sentence into silence. Her eyes glared defiance at him for a moment, then she returned to the business of eating. Lemming looked embarrassed. Dr. Bonetti shook his head. Captain Smith coughed, suggested mildly, "Captain Algase must be an excellent astronavigator, Lieutenant. I didn't notice a single jarring motion. In my day, escape from a vacuole was a tedious, ship-wracking process. Of course—" His eyes wandered about the table querulously, "Of course there are so many new inventions nowadays. Improvements in all lines. Spacecraft, air-modifiers, armament—"

Mallory rose suddenly. He was half angry with the ex-space officer. Smith wasn't being very subtle in his effort to help matters. No doubt the old duck meant well, but—

He said, "If you'll excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, I must go to the bridge. Ready, Bud?"

Bud Chandler gulped, "Ssswllwmcffy! Ulp!"

"What?"

"I said, 'As soon as I swallow my coffee!'" repeated the Second Mate aggrievedly. "Can't you understand English? Let's go."

Lemming intercepted them as they passed his end of the table. He asked, "Lieutenant, I've been wanting to ask for several days—might I be permitted to visit the bridge? This is my first spaceflight, you know. I've always wanted to see how the controls are operated."

"Speak to Captain Algase," suggested Dan. "That's not within my power—Yes, Billy?"

The mess-boy had just raced in from the outer deck, trayless, almost breathless. "Y're wanted on the bridge immejitely, Lootenant! Cap'n orders!" His eyes were as big as saucers. "Sparks just got a message through. A message from New Fresno!"

Dan had just time to notice, out of the corner of one eye, how this bald pronouncement affected the passengers. He saw the concerted motion that dragged them all to their feet as if they were puppets on a single string; saw the sudden gleam in Wilmot's eye, the worried frown that creased Bonetti's forehead, heard the swift, startled gasp from Lady Alice and intercepted Captain Smith's darting glances from one to another of the listeners. Lemming's voice quavered, "A—a message from New Fresno!" and Susan Wilmot laughed, a short, strident, triumphant burst of sound.

Then Dan Mallory saw no more. For with Chandler at his heels, he was pounding through the corridors to the Jacob's ladder that fed the control turret.

Captain Algase was no beauty even when garbed in his officer's blues; in pajamas and slippers he was something out of a nightmare. His bare legs were like cylindrical hair mattresses, his pajama slacks bulged at the equator as if he were concealing there a half watermelon. His eyes were red and gummy, his temper like something that could be poured out of a cruet. As Dan and Bud entered the control turret he was battering the bewildered radioman's defenses into oblivion with a salvo of verbal thermite.

"Message!" he was howling. "You call this thing a message! I'll have you stewed in slow gravy for waking me up like this, Sparks! Of all the damn, dumb—" He saw his two lieutenants. "Never mind, you two. Go back and finish your breakfast. False alarm."

"We've finished, Skipper," said Dan. "What's all the commotion?"

"This &![oe])$$[oe]09!—" began Algase.

Sparks said miserably, "But it was Marlowe's hand on the keys, Cap'n! I swear it was. I know the message don't make sense, but you can't fool a bug-pounder. Every radioman has a distinctive sending style. Ask anybody. Even one of them wise-cracking Donovan boys. They'll tell you. And this was Marlowe's hand—"

"Let's see," said Mallory. He took the flimsy from his senior's fingers, frowned as he ran an eye over the cryptic symbols. "Numerals! All numerals. Sparks—?"

"It was like this. The static interference is still going on. The audio wouldn't bring in voice at all. But as I was twisting the dials, I got this power wave from Lunar III, Joe Marlowe's station. It had a—a sort of cadence. I began putting down the things it sounded like, and—and that's what come out."

Chandler, peering over his comrade's shoulder, said,

"Well, hell's bells, are you all nuts? It must be a code of some sort. Sparks, we use several numerical codes, don't we?"

"Yes." Meekly. "But that ain't one of them, Lieutenant. That don't fit no code in the reg book."

Mallory continued to stare at the message. It was long, and undeniably confusing. It read:

83.7-152-232.12-167.64-31.02-16-184-167.64-9.02-1-126.92-144.27-

186.31-50.95-16-175-47.9-16-14.008-4.002-39.944-50.95-173.04-19-16-

10.25-69.87-14.008-16-184-232.12-186.31-39.944-127.61-14.008-20.183-

184-19-186.31-118.70-16-1-74.91-127.61-14.008-74.91-28.06-32.06-181.4-

14.008-140.13-138-92-20.183-184-39.944-222.-32.06-138.92-162.46-26.97-

126.92-140.13-40.08-10.82-26.97-32.06-31.02-88.92-14.008-16-184-16-

14.008-6.94-79.916-39.944-40.08-195.23-39.944-114.76-150.43-126.92-

232.12-114.76-127.61-14.008-32.06-126.92-19-88.92-140.92-16-127.61-

12-47.9-16-14.008-16-19-20.183-184-78.96-52.01-16.721-225.97-88.92—

"—and there it began all over again," said Sparks. "The same sequence. I agree, it's a code. But what good is a code when we ain't got the key to it. It ain't a simple word substitution cryptogram or a five-by-five. I studied them in the Academy, and tried them all before I brought this to the Captain. In other words, it ain't no good to us unless we've got the clue—and we ain't got the clue!"

Mallory said, "Billy said this was a message from New Fresno?"

"Well, he was wrong, as usual." Determinedly. "It come from Earth's moon. I know Joe Marlowe's fingers when I hear 'em. Damn, we was classmates for three years. Before I got crazy and gave up chemistry for key-pushing—"

"Chemistry!" Mallory started. "Did you say chemistry? Did you and Marlowe study chemistry together?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"Why! Because that's the answer. Marlowe is nobody's fool. He knew you were the radioman aboard the Libra, prepared a special code, the key to which would lie in your brain as the 'memory of auld lang syne'—Bud, look at these figures again. You notice the number '16' appearing over and over? Even in that thick skull of yours, '16' suggests—?"

"Oxygen," declared Chandler promptly. "The atomic weight of oxygen."

"And eighty-three point seven? Forty-seven, nine?"

"Krypton. And—let's see—titanium?"

"Right! Grab a pencil, pal! I think we've got a solution here. Jot these down—krypton, europium, thorium, erbium—Hold it!" He looked at his companion disgustedly. "Just the symbols, you dope! Don't you see? The symbols of the various elements employ every letter in the English language except 'j' and 'q'—and those are the two least commonly used, anyway. Start over. Krypton—"

"Kr," said Bud.

"Europium—"

"Eu."

"Thorium. Erbium—"

"'Kreuther'!" howled Bud. "That's it, Dan! Keep going!"

The message slowly scrawled its way onto paper. A word appeared, another, another. Then:

"Ten point twenty-five!" said Mallory. "Followed by 69.87! What the hell are they?"

Bud said, "Maybe he made a mistake? Boron's 10.82. Lithium's 6.94—"

"No. That's not it," said Mallory. He frowned. Captain Algase had long since wakened completely, was listening to his two juniors with glowing pride. Now he cut the Gordian knot.

"Chromium," he suggested, "is fifty-two point one, Dan. The reverse of the number that stumps you."

"Right! That's it, Skipper! And the meaning must be that the symbol is to be written in reverse. 'Rc' instead of 'Cr.' There aren't enough combinations to spell every word in the language unless you use some subterfuges like that."

"Which makes the word," said Bud, "'forces.' Go on, pal...."

Mallory plunged into the heart of the coded letter. "39.944—"

"Argon," said Bud, "'A.'"

"114.76. Indium. 150.43—"

"Samarium. 'Sa.' Next?"

"Iodine."

"'I.'"

The message was finished. Bud handed it to Captain Algase. Mallory's curiosity was at fever pitch. He had not been able to piece the letters together as he went along; he had gained but a smattering here and there. He waited. The skipper read slowly, breaking the message up into coherent sentences.

"'Kreuther power behind revolution. Heavy forces now threatening New Fresno—'"

"Kreuther, huh?" growled Bud. "I thought so."

"'Hasten assistance. Lane warns—'" The captain stopped, stared a moment, glanced swiftly at Mallory. There was a tight note in his voice. "'Lane warns Lady Alice, cabal spy, now in Libra—'"

"Lady Alice!" blurted Mallory. The warmth of the control turret suddenly weighed down upon him; his brow felt hot, oppressed, as if some gigantic hand had descended upon his temples.

"'Captain saith,'" continued Algase, "'intensify protection of new secret ray.'" He crumpled the paper. "And that is all, gentlemen. Mallory—"

"Yes, sir?"

"Our fears were justified. There is a spy on the Libra. We must take no chances. You will arrest Lady Alice Charwell, place her under lock and key for the duration of the voyage."

Bud Chandler muttered, "Where does Marlowe get that Old English stuff? 'Saith!' Why didn't he say, 'Says'?"

"Because," Mallory answered mechanically, "there is no 'ys' combination in the elemental vocabulary. He had to say it that way." The recollection of his unpleasant duty flooded back on him; with it came protest. "But it can't be true, Captain! There must be some mistake. Surely Lady Alice wouldn't be—"

"On the contrary, Daniel," Algase's voice was unusually gentle, "she would be. Once her family owned all of Io. It is more than likely that she should want to see the globe freed of Board control; regain her lost property. She could well be in league with Kreuther to overthrow the present government. According to this, she is."

"Yes, sir," acknowledged Dan dully. He was thinking of Captain Smith's warning. Of the book Lady Alice had been reading, the book on military tactics. "Shall I make the—the arrest now, sir?"

"Yes, Lieutenant."

"Very good, sir!" He turned and left the room. His jaw was white and rigid; a dull hurt was behind his eyes....

A strained assemblage awaited his return to the mess hall. As he entered the room all conversation ended abruptly; an almost audible silence fell upon the group of passengers. Lemming half rose from his seat, opened his mouth as though to say something, closed it again, his lips a white slit against the green pallor of his cheeks. Lady Alice's eyes were tense, expectant. Captain Smith moved forward to meet him. The ex-space officer's heavy frame was poised and ready; there was a note of subdued eagerness in his voice. He said stridently, "Well, Lieutenant—?"

Dan Mallory's patience with the older man was quite exhausted. He said curtly, but in a voice that did not reach the ears of the others, "Captain, I must remind you that you have no authority whatsoever on this ship! I appreciate your willingness to help, but—" Angrily. "For God's sake, man, stop acting like the hero of a Twenty-second century dime novel! Stop fingering your needle-gun, and—"

Smith looked embarrassed. His heavy shoulders sagged, and swift contrition swept over Mallory as the one-time officer said, "I—I'm sorry, Lieutenant."

Lemming had found words at last. He asked, shakily, "The—the message, Lieutenant? Was it—?"

He had to arrest Lady Alice, thought Dan Mallory. But he didn't have to humiliate her. To brand her eternally as a traitor in the eyes of her associates. And he still held doggedly to the hope that somehow, somewhere, had been made a dreadful mistake. He said, "The message was a routine transmission, Mr. Lemming. Of no great importance. Now, will you all be kind enough to disband, quietly?"

No one moved. Mallory, glancing at the faces about him, felt again that conviction that an interwoven webbing of intrigue entangled these passengers. He said, firmly, "That is not a request, but a command! You will all retire to the observation deck at once!"

The little group stirred. Mallory sought the side of Lady Alice, said, "I've been wanting to show you the ship, Lady Alice. Wouldn't you like to see it now?"

Her look of pleased surprise burned him. She said, "Why, Lieutenant, how nice! I would enjoy it."

They moved in a direction opposite that of the rest of the passengers. Even so, they did not escape unnoticed. From the corner of his eye Dan Mallory caught the glitter of Dr. Bonetti's spectacles, realized that the dumpy man was watching them shrewdly. And for a moment his eye met that of Captain Garland Smith; the old officer's head was nodding in mused speculation. He, too, had guessed Mallory's concealed purpose.

Only the girl herself seemed unaware that this was not merely a pleasantry. Her shoulder brushed that of Mallory as they pressed through a narrow doorway; the soft, feminine warmth of her heaped reproach on the young lieutenant, as did her words.

"Lieutenant, I see you can take advice as well as give it. I had no idea, last night, when I suggested that you reveal the man beneath the uniform more often, that you would actually—"

They were alone now. And Mallory turned to face her, his voice purposely hard and impersonal.

"If you please, Lady Alice! It is my painful duty to inform you that you are under arrest!"

"Under ar—!" Her gasp ended in a burst of light laughter. She brought her hand to her forehead in mock salute. "Aye, Lieutenant! Brig, ho! But if I'm not too inquisitive, what charges are preferred against me? Murder? Of course, I do kill time most horribly, but these long trips—or could it be theft? I'm sure I've stolen nothing. Unless you mean—" She paused in sudden confusion; her eyes lifted to his; there was something written there, something breathtaking. Mallory had to hold tight.

"The charge," he said tersely, "is—treason! That message was from Lunar III, Lady Alice. It bore a warning from the commander of the Intelligence Division there, advising us that you had been discovered to be a member of Igor Kreuther's organization!"

The light died from the girl's eyes, the smile on her lips turned to ice. Her slim body stiffened, straightened. And for an instant Dan Mallory saw, with swift prescience, that this girl was not all charm and allure; that beneath her tempting softness there was a core, steel-strong, of strength and daring.

"Treason! Treason, you—you blind fool!" she spat. "You dare accuse me, Lady Alice Charwell, Grand Duchess of Io, Lady of the Rocket and Globe, Maid of the Golden Crest, of—of treason! Sir! My family ruled Io when that dominion was first discovered. For almost three hundred years the Charwell crest has—"

"Please, Lady Alice!" pleaded Mallory. "I know how you feel about it. To your mind, your actions were not treasonable. But Io is no longer yours; it is under the guardianship of the Control Board. And you mustn't talk this way. I will be called to testify against you; anything you say will be convicting evidence—" He touched her shoulder as though the warmth of his hand might melt its icy stiffness.

She shrugged herself loose disdainfully.

"I think we can dispense with the amenities, Lieutenant. The smile on the lips ... the gracious invitation to 'see the ship' ... the friendly hand of comfort...." There was scorn, anger, pain in her eyes. "It is my right to demand the privilege of communicating with my accusers, is it not? Those on Earth who—?"

"I'm sorry. No audio transmission is possible because of the blanket-static. The message came through in a code."

"I see. I must wait, then, until we reach New Fresno. Never mind, Lieutenant Mallory. You have said enough. I presume you are placing me under guard? Where—in my own quarters? Very well. If you will be kind enough to escort me there!" She laughed brittlely. "But, of course, you will. You couldn't let a traitor out of your sight, could you?"

In throbbing, bitter silence they moved down the corridors to Lady Alice's stateroom. There she spoke for the last time.

"The message that accused me, Lieutenant. Might I be permitted to hear the damning evidence? What did it say?"

There was no harm, thought Mallory miserably, in telling her that. The words were like acid, etched into his brain. He repeated them. She listened intently, frowned—and then a new, curious look stole into her eyes. She said, "But—"

"Yes?" said Mallory. "Yes?"

The look faded. She laughed scornfully.

"Hoping to hear more 'convicting evidence,' Lieutenant? I'm so sorry to disappoint you. Now, will you lock the door after me, please?"

Dan Mallory made a last try. It would cost him his rocket if anyone heard his words, but—

"Lady Alice," he pleaded, "I'm honestly sorry about this. I don't believe you are guilty. If you'll trust me, tell me your side of the story, I'll do everything in my power to—"

"You have done," said the girl tightly, "more than enough right now. Guard me well, Lieutenant!" With a short, mocking laugh she slipped through the door, Mallory waited a long minute, then turned the key in the lock. Its grate was a taunting sneer. He returned to the bridge....

He couldn't help overhearing the end of that conversation. The runway that fed the control turret was narrow and metal-walled; it formed a perfect soundbox. Moreover, the door was ajar. The voice was Captain Algase reached his ears perfectly as he approached the room.

"—don't want to have to remind you again, Norton, that it is highly unethical for a space officer to become involved with a woman passenger. Especially with a married woman."

And the surly voice of Third Mate Rick Norton saying, "Very well, sir!" Then footsteps approaching the door, a figure confronting his squarely, Norton flushing, snarling, "Getting an earful, Mallory?"

Dan was in no mood for bickering. He said, "Don't mind me, Norton. I've known for months you were a skirt-chaser. I don't consider it any of my business."

Norton's cheeks flamed. He said insultingly, "And I suppose you stand behind your stripes as you say that?"

"Forget the stripes." Mallory looked at his fists. "I stand behind these."

"Good!" Norton swung. He was a well-built man, a strong man. His blow packed dynamite—but it needed a target to set off the percussion cap. It found no target but a moving one. Mallory ducked, rolled with the punch, came up inside the Third Mate's guard to land a short, jabbing left to the midsection, a blasting right to the point of Norton's jaw. Norton gasped and collapsed soggily. Arms behind him reached out to support his falling weight; other lips behind Mallory whistled softly as Bud Chandler, coming up to serve his trick, witnessed the swift, decisive exchange of blows. And Captain Algase, releasing Norton's inert form, glared at Mallory.

"Well! Well, Lieutenant, I think you know we have rules against brawling?"

"Aye, sir!"

"But—" Captain Algase stroked his jaw speculatively, "In this case—Chandler, get him below! It served him right. Maybe he'll spend this rest period sleeping, instead of stirring up trouble amongst the passengers. Dan, my boy—"

He led the way back into the turret, completed the log record for the previous trick, handed it to Mallory, who had slipped into the control bucket.

"Twenty-four more Earth hours and we'll be there," he said. "And, believe me, I'll be glad when this trip ends. Trouble. Nothing but trouble from beginning to end. Long tricks and short tempers. Norton getting mixed up with that Wilmot dame—a damn' hussy if I ever saw one, and her husband a neurotic wreck. Smith bothering the blistering Hades out of me, wanting to 'help' catch spies and a thousand other—" He glanced at Mallory, who had stiffened at the word. His glance was sympathetic. "I'm sorry I had to ask you to arrest her, Daniel. But it's experiences like that that make strong men out of space officers.

"You have to be hard in this business. Crime hides beneath strange disguises. The sweetest smiles, the friendliest hand-shakes, the most honeyed words, may conceal—"

"If you please, sir!" said Dan Mallory, white-lipped.

"I know, lad. I've seen the way you looked at her. But remember—forty thousand innocent lives! Had she learned the secret of that new weapon, our voyage might have been disastrous. From this distance she could have made a flight to Io in one of the auxiliary safety rockets, given the plans to Kreuther's forces. The very weapon we look to for salvation would have been used against us. Io might have become a nest of rebellion, instead of a peaceful member of the solar family. Now that we've snared our spy, the messenger—whoever he is—will be safe."

On the visiplate it was a glowing red spark, but in the perilens before him it was a gigantic orb dominating the heavens through which the Libra hurtled. Jupiter; monster of Sol's scattered brood, untamed sphere of writhing gases and vague mystery, itself a pseudo-parent emanating enough heat to make its far-flung satellites livable worlds. Soon they would fling themselves, they aboard the Libra, halfway around that gigantic orb, settle to the small body now wanly visible as a silver crescent.

Dan Mallory punched a control-key savagely, felt the Libra shake itself into a slightly changed curve, turned to his superior.

"I'm not so sure of that, sir. Oh, I'm not trying to defend Lady Alice. Earth's Intelligence officers don't make mistakes—not mistakes of that magnitude, anyway. But there are other passengers I don't trust. Lemming. Wilmot. Dr. Bonetti. Why are they aboard the Libra? Why were they so excited when they heard we'd received a message from Lunar III? Suppose one of them is also a spy?"

"Or suppose," said the skipper, "one of them bears the secret of the new ray weapon. Wouldn't that one naturally be excited?"

"But the others?" Mallory inquired.

"I don't know. You may have something there, Daniel. I'm still taking no chances. I've put Aiken on guard at Lady Alice's door. If anyone tries to liberate her—What is it, Sparks?"

He snapped the query at the intercommunications box which was spluttering and growling. The radioman's tone was weary. "It's Mr. Wilmot again, sir. He insists on talking to you."

"Tell Mr. Wilmot I will see him at midday mess."

Sparks was stubborn about it.

"But he insists his message is important, sir. He demands to see you at once. Says—"

"Demands!" The skipper's jowls reddened. "Please tell Mr. Wilmot passengers do not demand favors of spaceship officers. I will see him at mess. That is all!" And he cut the communications board; turned to Mallory angrily. "That's why I didn't put you on report for slugging Norton. Wilmot's mad as a hornet and I don't blame him. Norton catting around after his wife—"

Chandler appeared, grinning. He said to Mallory, "What a sock, pal, what a sock! If that guy counts sheep in his sleep, he's going to wake up allergic to mutton. Wish I had done it. He's a grouchy son-of-a— What's biting you?"

Mallory said, "That's just it, damn it! I don't quite know. It just came upon me like a flash that someone said something funny ... something that didn't ring true ... but I can't remember what it was. If I could—"

"See, Skipper? It's got him, too. We're all going to be candidates for the straitjacket squad when we finish this trip."

Algase smiled sourly. "Well, don't lift gravs for the next twenty-four hours, that's all I ask. See you later, boys." He turned to leave; was interrupted by the buzz of the intercommunications box. "What, again! Yes, Sparks—what is it this time? If it's Wilmot again, tell him to go beat his brains out with a rusty bar! I'll see him at—"

Sparks' voice was harsh with excitement.

"It is Wilmot, sir! But I can't tell him anything. He's dead, sir! Murdered!"

Chandler said, "Murdered? Mi-god!" Captain Algase said a more effective and less printable thing which ended in, "Come on!" And he and Chandler pounded down the runway, their footsteps ringing on the Jacob's-ladder, disappearing in the distance.

Dan Mallory, his thoughts chaotic, sat chained to his bucket seat by the obligation of guiding the spaceship through the treacherous void. His fingers played over the control keys automatically; slowly the chaos left his brain and cold, clear, reasoning thought took its place.

Wilmot dead. Why? The first thought that suggested itself was Norton. Motive—jealousy. The desire to get Susan Wilmot's husband out of the way so—

But that was illogical. Norton was a skirt-chaser and a quixotic fool, but he wasn't a criminal. Murder was not in his line. Why else, then?

Because Wilmot had been the bearer of the formula? Had he been slain by a spy? And if so, by whom? Lady Alice was in her cabin, or at least—with a swift constriction of the throat—Dan hoped she was. He pressed the intercommunications button hurriedly; Sparks' face appeared before him on the visiplate. "Get me the M-13 plate, Sparks! The one in the stateroom passageway!"

The scene shifted. Aiken, a space gob, looked up as the audio before him glowed into life, touched his forelock respectfully. "Lieutenant Mallory?"

"The prisoner is in her stateroom?"

"Aye, sir."

"She hasn't been out?"

"Not for a moment, sir." The sailor added, "Might I ask the lootenant what the h—I mean, what's going on?"

"Plenty!" snapped Dan. "That's all, sailor. Carry on!"

The glow faded. Mallory shook his head. No dice on that hunch. Then what else—?

The thought came so suddenly, so breathtakingly, that it literally lifted him out of his chair. There was but one possible answer! The reverse of his former theory. Wilmot was neither the bearer of the precious secret nor a spy. He was the "innocent bystander"; the traditional victim who, from time immemorial, has always been the one to get bopped. Somehow the nervous, jittery little man had learned who the spy was. He had attempted to communicate his knowledge to Captain Algase; the petulance of his own nature had rendered this impossible. And the spy, knowing that Wilmot had learned his secret, had—

Again he pressed the button. This time Sparks said, "Lieutenant Mallory? Have you seen Mr. Lemming? The captain wants to question him, but he can't be found anywhere—"

"Never mind that!" rapped Mallory. "Sparks, I want to know this. How was Wilmot killed?"

"Rayed, sir. Needled."

"I thought as much. And who was the first to find him?"

"Dr. Bonetti, sir. He's being held under suspicion. He confesses to having supplied Wilmot with drugs, sir. Teklin-root, sir. (That would be, thought Mallory swiftly, the package surreptitiously exchanged in the observation room.) But he claims he didn't kill Wilmot—"

"Quick, man! Was Captain Smith anywhere around the radio turret when this happened?"

"Why—why, he had been, sir. But he left before Mr. Wilmot did—"

Captain Algase's face appeared in the visiplate beside that of Sparks. "Daniel, my boy, keep your eye peeled for Lemming. He's disappeared. Susan Wilmot has told us he isn't a jewel merchant at all; he's a jewel thief! Fleeing Earth to gain settler's amnesty on Io. Wilmot knew his secret, tried to blackmail him. Lemming threatened—"

"You're after the wrong man!" screamed Dan Mallory. "Captain, I see it all, now! The whole story. These other things have confused us. Sparks, swiftly—get me that M-13 plate again!"

The scene spun, changed dizzily. Once again Mallory was gazing down the corridor where Aiken had stood guard. But Aiken no longer stood before Lady Alice Charwell's door. He lay there, limp, still forever. A smoking hole charred his broad chest, crimson stirred sluggishly from the needle-ray's telltale trail. The door of the stateroom was open.

A hoarse bellow told Dan that the captain was seeing the same scene.

"She did it! She killed him and escaped!"

"No!" roared Mallory. "Smith did it! The man we should have suspected all the time; the man who admitted his guilt, but I was too blind to see it. Kreuther's spy. The renegade space officer—Captain, did you feel that?"

His space-trained senses had felt the swift, tiny moment of jarring repercussion that meant only one thing—that from one of the escape ports a life-skiff, an auxiliary safety rocket, had slipped from its base on the Libra, taken off into space!

"He's escaping! He's kidnaped her and taken off in a life-skiff. Bud! Take over! I'm lifting gravs!"

And for the first time in his career as an officer of the SSP, Lieutenant Daniel Mallory violated, deliberately, a rule of the Space Patrol handbook. He rammed the Libra's controls into the robot hands of the Iron Mike, and abandoned his post in mid-flight!

It was not that he considered himself more capable than his captain or the second mate. His move was dominated by only one thing, the urgent need for haste. Safety rockets are, as everyone knows, blindingly fast. Much faster than the heavier, sturdier, cruising vessels that bear them like so many unfledged wallabies in a pouch. Give Smith a flying start and he would never be apprehended. And he, Dan Mallory, was much nearer a life-skiff port than the other officers up in the loft of the radio turret.

Slipping, skidding, stumbling in his haste, he raced to the nearest port, flung open the control-bar, threw himself into the small, tear-shaped vehicle lying there. There were regulations demanding that air, food, water supplies be ascertained before flight in one of these was attempted. But there was no time for such nonsense now. Each second seemed an hour as Mallory warmed the hypatomic motors of the skiff, rammed the button that opened the Libra's outer shell, struck another that catapulted the safety-rocket away from its parent craft.

Then the dark of the womblike casing was gone, and he was blasting, under his own power, through space illumined with the candle-gleams of a trillion galactic motes. He set his range-finder and attractor—but even as their needles found their objective, his searching eyes located it. A tiny, silvery gleam against the tawny night ahead—a gleam from the stern of which flared burst upon flaming burst of superheated light.

The rockets of Smith's skiff, hell-bent for Io!

Minutes had been precious! Vitally so. Already the little craft was countless thousands of miles before him. It was a wide margin that separated him; and in that margin lay the difference between freedom and peonage for forty thousand Earth-men, millions of Ionians, the difference between life and death for the girl Smith had kidnaped, the difference between victory and defeat for the Solar Patrolmen.

There was only one way to catch Smith. Recognizing the fact, Dan Mallory bit his lip, set his jaw stubbornly. Acceleration! Acceleration great enough to fling him across the yawning void, enable him to snare his quarry in tensiles....

And he was not strapped! No safety corset to hold tight the straining cords of his viscera, no yards of gauze padding to keep his wracked body from literally flinging itself to shreds. No—

He glanced about him hurriedly. There were piles of cushions, soft, plump, airy, scattered about the metallic cockpit. He jammed a dozen of these behind him, under him, about him. There was an oxy-helmet in its container beside him; he thrust this over his head. Its rubberoid halter settled about his chest, his shoulders. At least his straining eyes would not bulge from their sockets; by adjustment—if he could raise a hand—he could compensate accelerative force with pressure.

He drew a deep breath. Then, recklessly, wrenched the dial of the motor to full acceleration!

It was as though ten thousand fiery demons tore at his body with claws of flame. A weight, massive, imponderable, kicked the breath out of his lungs, forced it from his gaping mouth and flared nostrils into the helmet he wore. He gulped and strangled, fighting to draw into a shrunken chest a breach of fleeing life. One hand moved—or tried to—to his throat in an instinctive gesture of distress. The hand moved a half inch from his knee, flung itself back into his stomach like a leaden weight.

The quick burst of nausea saved his life, because tortured ductless glands released a stream of adrenalin into his churning blood-stream, the miraculously adaptable body of Man rose once again above its normal limitations. Air crept into his lungs, his heart's tumultuous pounding no longer throbbed a threnody in his eardrums.

Still he could move with only the greatest of effort—but he could move! And his eyes, no longer blinded by the red mist that had drowned their sockets, saw the rocket-flares before him seem to literally stop in mid-flight, race back toward him!

A great exultation seized him. He was hardly aware that bright blood had burst from his nostrils, and that as he opened his lips to shout hoarsely the corners of his mouth drooled red. The craft he pursued whirled fiercely toward him; like flame-riding charioteers they jockeyed across the cosmic wastes. Smith knew he was there. Must know. But—Mallory's grin was the grimace of a gargoyle—he didn't have the guts to duplicate the young lieutenant's mad burst of speed.

He was depending on other weapons. Even as Mallory experienced the thought, a stabbing beam spat backward from the other rocket, a coruscating ray of silver that bore sudden death.

But Mallory had anticipated the move; his slow hand had been straining for seconds to forestall it. He pressed a lever—the ship slid into a dive. Another and the terrible pressure lifted from his limbs, his body felt suddenly light and buoyant, strength surged back to him with singing sweetness.

Again that stabbing ray searched for him. But Dan Mallory was no novice at the art of space warfare. He spun his craft into a cycloid Laegland arc, the lethal ray spent itself on indestructible space, and when Mallory came out of his maneuver he was within scant miles of his objective.

Grinning savagely, his hand sought the button that would smash Smith's ship into oblivion—then stayed! Lady Alice! He could not destroy her with Smith. Because now he knew, certainly and surely, two things. One of which was that she must be the bearer of the secret ray formula to Io. In no other way could you account for the fact that Smith had dared everything to kidnap her. She carried the secret, not in papers, but in her mind.

Were she to die—and might the gods of space forbid that his hand should destroy her loveliness!—Kreuther would still be the victor. For with her would perish the final hope of the besieged New Fresno garrison.

The other thing he realized was—

But there was no time for that now. His fingers spurned the ray button; found another. A jolt shivered the space-skiff from fore-quartz to rocket as his tensile beam reached across the closing miles, fastened its grip on Smith's craft.

Mallory's grin tightened. He cut motors. His tensile beam would contract like a rubber band, drawing the two ships together. Smith, feeling that beam upon him, unable to sheer it off, would not be able to turn a lethal radiation upon him now. For the tensile beam was a perfect conduction ray. To destroy one ship meant to destroy both.

There was a groan behind him. Shocked, he turned. From the storage bin, bleeding from nose, ears, mouth, body twisted as though wrung through some gigantic mangler, crawled the missing jewel thief—Albert Lemming!

Mallory choked, sickened. "Lord, man! How did you get aboard here? Why—"

Liquid breath gurgled in Lemming's throat. Glaze filmed his eyeballs. "Tried to—" he panted, "—stow away. Wilmot dead—knew suspect me—hid—"

His head fell forward to the floor. Dan fingered his pulse, found there not the feeblest stir of life. Lemming, fleeing the dreaded breath of suspicion, had lost the more important breath of life. The miracle was that he had survived, even so long, the tremendous acceleration that had taxed all Mallory's space-trained, protected faculties.

And the two space-skiffs closed inexorably the gap between them. Mallory's quick brain leaped to the final problem. But before he could solve it, the small skiff audio burst into speech.

"Well done, whoever you are!" said the voice from the other skiff. "But you realize it won't do you any good?"

Mallory rasped, "I'm coming alongside in a minute, Smith. Stand by to surrender peaceably, or—"

"Or?" mocked the ex-space officer. "So it's you, Lieutenant? I might have guessed it. Your valor is exceeded only by your lack of foresight. I repeat, your hectic pursuit has done you no good."

"Never mind the talk. Stand by. This is the end," said Mallory. "This is checkmate, Smith."

"Not checkmate, my gallant young friend," corrected Smith. "Stalemate. True, you hold me captive in your beam. But to what end? You can't hope to take me alive. Whenever I choose, I can blast you and myself into atoms. And with us goes—" he paused significantly—"Lady Alice! Ah, you are silent, Lieutenant? I thought you would be. Of course, I'm an old man. These youthful romancings no longer interest me. But—bless us, she's much too beautiful to die, isn't she, Lieutenant?"

Lady Alice's voice interrupted.

"Take him, Dan! Don't think about me. I'm not afraid to—"

"You hear, Lieutenant? The girl's gallantry is a fit match for your own. But by this time, surely, you have realized that if she dies, the secret of the new ray weapon dies with her. I think my leader's forces will have taken New Fresno before a second messenger reaches Io."

It was the truth. Knowing that, Dan Mallory groaned. This was a deadlock; one that neither force could break. He said slowly, "Well, Captain? What is your price for Lady Alice's safety?"

"My own," replied the renegade spaceman promptly, "and the secret she bears. I'm not an unreasonable man, Lieutenant. Even though—" bitterness edged his words—"even though the Solar Space Patrol did take the best years of my life, squeeze the heart out of me, throw my aging body into the discard like a dried pulp. No, I'm not unreasonable—"

So that was it. The self-pity of an aging man, perhaps a man gone off his gravs from the letdown after active years. That was why Smith had renounced his SSP pledge, gone over to the other side. Captain Algase's words rang in Dan's memory. "Where there are new causes, there are traitors to the old—" Even a spaceman was not exempt from human weakness.

"If Lady Alice will surrender her secret to me," the renegade captain was continuing, "with convincing proof that the formula she gives me is no lie, I will permit you both to live. I will allow you to keep one of these ships, return to safety—"

Mallory thought feverishly. It was against his every scruple to parley thus with the other man. But he could gain nothing by destroying himself and Lady Alice. Alive, there was always a chance they might win through to the New Fresno fort, carry their message, howsoever belated. If they died, Kreuther and his hirelings would surely win.

He said, "Very well, Smith. I accept. Give him the formula, Lady Alice."

Her answer was tense, vivid.

"No! No, Dan, don't trust him! He won't keep his promise. I know he won't!"

"We must take that chance." Grimly. "Tell him!"

The audio went dead. Mallory waited impatiently. Somewhere, lost in the immensity that engulfed them, the Libra surged through space on a mission now in the hands of the deadlocked three. So near that it was more sunlike than Sol, Jupiter swung in its titanic orbit about Man's luminary. The endless night was spangled with an infinitude of stars. The stars toward which Man, yearning, groped—while Man's feet still stumbled through the muck and mire of deceit....

And the audio woke to life again. Smith's voice was triumphant. "Very well, Lieutenant. I am satisfied. I have finished the demolition of power and arms units in this ship. Its radio, however, still operates. I think it will sustain life for you until your friends arrive. I am ready to board your ship."

Lady Alice's cry broke in, "Be careful, Dan! He'll kill you! He—" There was the sound of flesh upon flesh, a silence. Then, "Well, Lieutenant?"

Dan said, "Come ahead."

"You will take your place," said Smith, "in the pilot's seat where I can see you from the moment I enter the lock. Put your hands above your head. Do not move or turn as I enter. If you do—"

"Come ahead," repeated Dan. The audio disconnected.

Dan sprang into motion. He believed Lady Alice's warning. And he was prepared to meet subtlety with subtlety; deceit with deceit. Not yet had Smith won. He bent and lifted the broken body of Albert Lemming. Hurriedly he jammed the oxy-helmet down over the dead man's bloody features. He grunted, "Sorry, pal!" as he hoisted Lemming into the pilot's chair, forced stiffening arms back and up in token of surrender. The high back of the chair, the padded cushions made the form hold its position.

He finished just in time. There was a scraping at the airlock. The two ships had drifted side to side now, and entry was a simple matter. Mallory ducked back into the compartment from which Lemming had emerged. His needle gun was in his hand, poised, ready....

Smith entered quietly. He glanced once at the figure in the pilot's chair, said, "Don't move, Lieutenant—" and his arm raised. The girl's warning had been all too true. There was rankest treachery in the leveling of that gun, in the fiery needle dart that hurled across the chamber, burying itself in Lemming's defenseless head. The stench of charred flesh filled the room. The dead body wobbled, lurched to the floor. And—

"Now, you stand still, Smith!" gritted Mallory.

Smith whirled, his jaw dropping open. In his eyes dawned horror, disappointment, rage. He cried out once, raised his gun.

That was how he died. With his traitorous fingers lifted for the last time against a man who wore the uniform he had once worn ... and had disgraced....

Afterward, as they stood in the control turret of the Libra, watching a sober-faced Rick Norton plot the landing that would bring new life to the Ionian colonists, swift retribution to the fomenters of the uprising, Bud Chandler whaled his comrade's back enthusiastically.

"Guy," he said, "in words of one syllable, you're terrific!"

"That's not one syllable," grinned Mallory.

"All right, then, you're a lallapalooza! But how the blue asteroids did you get onto the fact Smith was the guy?"

Dan said, "It came to me almost too late. It had been worrying me subconsciously ever since I had to—" here he flushed—"had to arrest Lady Alice. I knew that someone had, in conversation with me, said something that didn't ring true. And when Wilmot was killed for having discovered the truth about Smith, I suddenly remembered what it was.

"The night before we got the message from Lunar III, assuring us that Kreuther was behind the revolution, Smith had mentioned to me, quite casually, that he suspected there were on the Libra 'espionage agents of the Kreuther forces.' What he was attempting to do, of course, was ally himself with us in order to divert suspicion. But he tipped his hand by that little slip of the tongue."

Lady Alice smiled. She said, "Well, you're not awfully smart. Any of you. I knew he was the spy as soon as I heard the message from Earth."

Captain Algase interrupted, "Yeah, that message! I'm going to raise an assortment of hell about that. Causing us to arrest the one person on board we could really trust."

"And all," smiled the girl, "because of one, small, chemical symbol that you misread. Oh, yes, I understand now. I've seen the original. Bud—you went to the Academy, didn't you?"

"Why—why, yes."

"Your professor there must have been quite an old man. I mean your chemistry prof."

"He was. Ancient. But what has that got to do with it?"

"Everything. He taught you the old, the original chemical symbol for the element samarium. 'Sa.' The more common symbol, the generally accepted one, is 'Sm.' Now you see what a great difference that one little error makes in the meaning of the message. You read it:

"'Lane warns Lady Alice, cabal spy, now on Libra. Captain saith intensify protection of new secret ray.'"

"And it should have been read," broke in Dan Mallory, understanding at last, "'Lane warns Lady Alice cabal spy now on Libra—Captain Smith! Intensify protection—' and so on. It was a warning to you, not about you!"

"Exactly. Naturally, I was—well, indignant when I was placed under arrest. Afterward, I began to think it a good idea. Confined to my quarters, guarded, I would be completely safe. But unfortunately Captain Smith guessed, when I was arrested, that I was the bearer of the formula. So he killed my guard, seized the skiff, and kidnaped me.

"Saith!" grunted Bud Chandler disgustedly. "I told you that word was phony. Joe Marlowe never used good English in his life when a cuss-word would do just as well. Hey! Where are you two going?"

It is doubtful whether Dan Mallory heard the question. There was one other little matter that needed clearing up—but soon! That was the way Lady Alice Charwell, in the moment of their mutual peril, had hurdled the amenities of speech, addressed him not as "Lieutenant," or even as plain "Mallory," but as—

"Dan," he said. "You called me 'Dan.' It's not right, Lady Alice. You shouldn't do things like that unless you mean them. And I—"

"Suppose," she asked, "I like that part of your name best. It is a nice name, you know."

Dan Mallory's big hands pawed futilely at the blue of his uniform. "So," he croaked, "is Mallory. And—and I guess I'm completely crazy. I couldn't ask you to share a name like that. I'm just a space cop. And you're a Lady. A titled Lady."

She said softly, "A Lady, Dan? There is no Duchy of Io any more. That's a thing of the past, and my title is only a courtesy. And, oh—I'm so tired of courtesies. I'm a space cop, too, now. There's nothing in the rules to keep two cops from teaming up, is there? Oh, you big, damn, dumb idiot—!"

Her face, smiling up at his, was inclined at just the right angle. They told him afterward that Rick Norton made a swell landing. He didn't believe it. For it seemed to Dan Mallory that the whole cosmos was swirling and dancing and twisting upside down in a delirium of delight....

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