Together we strode from the sickbay, through the tunnel to the airlock.
Ginger intercepted us at the First Hall. Her guards held a man at
pistol point.
"Naomi ... Vera ... whichever of you is in charge now. We've just
caught an Io spy!"
He was an older man, balding, seedy-appearing in an old-style tweed
suit. He stared at us in a calm, unflustered manner, plainly curious.
"Oho! Now we can get even for the way they treated Phyllis." Naomi was
gleefully thumbing through her mental catalog of torture techniques.
"If he's a spy," I said, "let's not waste any time on him now. We can
take care of him when we get back."
Jeanette had followed us in the tunnel. "He doesn't look like a spy to
me," she said drily.
"Oh no?" said Ginger. "Then how did he find our hideout? How did he
learn our landing code?"
Suddenly I recalled my feeling of being followed. "I thought there was
someone trailing me in space this morning. All the way from Ganymede I
had the weirdest sensation."
"Well, that may explain how he got here," said Jeanette, "but I still
say this guy isn't a spy."
"You're quite right," said the man. "I'm not a spy."
"Sure," Jeanette continued in her lanky farm accents, "the first
prerequisite for a spy is to look inconspicuous. This old character
couldn't do much hiding in a girl's dormitory."
"Old man, how did you come here?" I demanded.
"I landed at the entrance of your cave, madam, and asked to be
admitted. Then your colleagues," he nodded at Ginger, "seized me before
I could explain my purpose in coming here."
"No matter what he says, I think he's a spy," said Ginger. "This is a
very subtle angle they're playing. I'm security officer; it's my job to
outguess them."