The T.I.S. agent, his bony fingers locked beneath his head, was
stretched face up on his bunk. There were five of them in the ship's
brig--Saxon, Murdock and Villainowski, Mercedes, the anthropologist and
Brand, the bio-chemist.
"Jon, that girl's crazy about you."
"What?" Jon Saxon swung up his head, regarded Murdock coldly.
Without moving, the T.I.S. agent repeated, "She's in love with you,
Jon. Though what Ileth can find to love in that ugly granite mug of
yours is beyond comprehension."
Saxon said, "So what?" Everyone was watching him speculatively.
They had been cooped together for nine days now, the four men and the
woman. Yesterday the ship had landed. But none of them knew where.
"So what?" Murdock echoed breaking the silence. "My Lord, man, play up
to her. She's eating her heart out for you. Can't you see it's our only
chance?"
"No," said Saxon stiffly and blocked out their thoughts. "No, I don't.
You know as well as I do, that the crew and the officers, even the
staff, except Mercedes and Brand here sold out to General Atomic.
Suppose I did persuade Ileth to let us out. Suppose she comes over to
our side--which I tell you right now she won't--but suppose she did.
What possible chance would the five of us have against sixty armed
desperate men and women? Hell, Murdock, we couldn't even get the ship
back to Earth by ourselves!" He hesitated. "Besides it strikes me as a
contemptible stunt...."
Murdock's cold blue eyes flashed. He sat up, swinging his feet to the
deck. "Do you think we're playing a game?"
Mercedes, the gray-haired woman, interrupted, "Don't nag him, Murdock.
Everyone isn't a cold-blooded monster like you."
The T.I.S. agent grunted his disgust, lay back down and rolled to his
stomach.
Mercedes was a pleasant-faced, middle-aged woman with bright black eyes
like a parrot.
"I don't see yet," she continued imperturbably, "how General Atomic
could contact everyone before we sailed." She smoothed her skirts,
sitting primly on the brig's only chair, and cast a sly look at
Murdock. "Not with the vaunted T.I.S. on guard."
"Humph!" came Murdock's muffled voice from the pillow. "What's so
damned impossible about that? We couldn't watch the beggars all the
time." He rolled back and sat up again.
"No. What bothers me is why they didn't give themselves away. They were
investigated. All of them were reputable Government men, their fathers
Government men before 'em."
"It's hard to refuse a million credits," Saxon pointed out.