"Look, boys!" Orville put his hands on the top rail of the fence and climbed across. He was getting his shoes wet in the weeds in Harold's garden, but he didn't care. "The man has work to do. Can't you leave him alone?" * * * * * He picked up the jug and took Harold by the elbow and led him into the shed. There, resting on some concrete blocks on the dirt floor, was the base of the ship. In the semi-darkness, it looked harmless enough: like a tank, six or eight feet across, reaching up through a jagged hole in the roof. "Harold, you could make a good thing out of this," Orville said. "All this publicity." Harold was climbing a rickety ladder to the roof. Orville followed. "Mount this thing on a trailer. Take her around to fairs and carnivals." Orville waited on the roof while Harold climbed another ladder to the small oval door in the side of the ship. Harold called down: "You never saw the inside. Want to look around?" "Well...." Orville glanced into his back yard. Polly wasn't ready yet. He climbed up and handed the jug to Harold and stuck his head in. "Huh!" There wasn't much to see. Just a small compartment with some pipes leading from below into the nose. "You got to fix this up," he said. "Some Rube Goldberg contraptions." "The works are all up here." Harold climbed a ladder and disappeared through a hole overhead. "C'mon up, I'd like you to see this!" Orville looked down again into his yard. "It'll take her forever! Polly, I mean. Okay, I guess I got time for a look." He stepped in and climbed until his waist was through the hole. * * * * * The nose of the ship was dark. Harold was shining an extension lamp around. There were parts of a junked car and some old plumbing fixtures and Orville recognized the wheels of a lawnmower he'd left by the alley for the trash men to pick up. This didn't look like the inside of a spaceship. It looked exactly like a corner in Harold's basement. "Oh, Lord," Orville said. "I call this my scope." Harold was shining the light on a shaving mirror, on a long arm that could be swung and tilted about. "How about that? Pretty neat, huh?" Neat was hardly the word for it. "Look here, Harold! The neighbors are getting an injunction. Why don't you play it smart? Fight it out in the courts. There'll be a lot of publicity--" "They are?" Harold was hurt. He was shining the lamp in Orville's eyes. "Yeah. Now while you're fighting it out in the courts--" "Do you call that neighborly?" "They're scared. They're afraid you'll blow the whole neighborhood to pieces." "Well, hell with them!" "While we're on that subject, ain't that my trouble lamp you're holding?" "Yeah. Guess it is. Need it right away?" "Just want you to remember where it came from." "Actually, it'll be no use on the trip. I got her fixed so when I take off, the cord down at the base will come unplugged and--"