His infra-beam showed it clearly. A round, plate-shaped mass about a mile in diameter, built of three tiers of spaceships. Hulks, ancient, rusty, pitted things that had died and not been decently buried, welded together in a solid mass by lengths of pipe let into their carcasses. Before, when he had seen it, Campbell had been in too much of a hurry to do more than curse it for getting in his way. Now he thought it was the most desolate, Godforsaken mass of junk that had ever made him wonder why people bothered to live at all. He touched the throttle, tempted to go back to the swamps. Then he thought of what was going to happen back there, and took his hand away. "Hell!" he said. "I might as well look inside." He didn't know anything about the internal set-up of Romany--what made it tick, and how. He knew Romany didn't love the Coalition, but whether they would run to harboring criminals was another thing. It wouldn't be strange if they had been given pictures of Roy Campbell and told to watch for him. Thinking of the size of the reward for him, Campbell wished he were not quite so famous. Romany reminded him of an old-fashioned circular mouse-trap. Once inside, it wouldn't be easy to get out. "Of all the platinum-plated saps!" he snarled suddenly. "Why am I sticking my neck out for a bunch of semi-human swamp-crawlers, anyhow?" He didn't answer that. The leading edge of Romany knifed toward him. There were lights in some of the hulks, mostly in the top layer. Campbell reached for the radio. He had to contact the big shots. No one else could give him what he needed. To do that, he had to walk right up to the front door and announce himself. After that.... The manual listed the wave-length he wanted. He juggled the dials and verniers, wishing his hands wouldn't sweat. "Spaceship _Black Star_ calling Romany. Calling Romany...." His screen flashed, flickered, and cleared. "Romany acknowledging. Who are you and what do you want?" * * * * * Campbell's screen showed him a youngish man--a Taxil, he thought, from some Mercurian backwater. He was ebony-black and handsome, and he looked as though the sight of Campbell affected him like stale beer. Campbell said, "Cordial guy, aren't you? I'm Thomas Black, trader out of Terra, and I want to come aboard." "That requires permission." "Yeah? Okay. Connect me with the boss." The Taxil now looked as though he smelled something that had been dead a long time. "Possibly you mean Eran Mak, the Chief Councillor?" "Possibly," admitted Campbell, "I do." If the rest of the gypsies were anything like this one, they sure had a hate on for outsiders. Well, he didn't blame them. The screen blurred. It stayed that way while Campbell smoked three cigarettes and exhausted his excellent vocabulary. Then it cleared abruptly.