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Karl was holding his breath, staring at the outline of the hatch on the ship’s rusty side. It opened and the flight of descent stairs slid out. The captain and crew came out first.

Then the women filed down the ladder, smiling timidly and looking cold and frightened.

I

It is true that there are men with a scientific turn of mind who, at the same time, you can feel safe to stand with shoulder to shoulder, in an emergency. Young Hendricks, who was my junior officer on the Ertak, back in those early days of the Special Patrol Service, about which I have written so much, was one of these.

Nor, now that I come to think of the matter in the cool and impartial manner which is typical of me, was young Hendricks the only one. There was a chap—let’s see, now. I remember his face very well; he was one of those dark, wiry, alert men, a native of Earth, and his name was—Inverness! Carlos Inverness. Old John Hanson’s memory isn’t quite as tricky as some of these smart young officers of the Service, so newly commissioned that the silver braid is not yet fitted to the curve of their sleeves, would lead one to believe.