Of course the patrolman discussed the details of his work with half a dozen technicians, but the person he warmed to was one of the few women in the lab. She was a radar operator who had been cashiered from a mail packet for some disgraceful episode on Mars. Blonde and good-looking in a stocky way, she answered to the name of Greta, wore her harness with an air, swore like a trooper, smoked cigars, drove her subordinates until they dropped, and worshipped money as her only God. For some reason she took a fancy to "Dave" and overlooked many of his early errors while damning others for less serious mistakes. In other words, Frank found himself getting nowhere with his plan to sow dissension among the crew. As in early stages of the three great wars, they were frantically loyal to their brutal ideals and leaders. If there had been rivalry involved, the spacemen felt he might have accomplished something. This idea, plus a longing to look at Sadie, caused him to pay a visit to the director. The latter, now but a bloody caricature of himself, still maintained his iron rule from a hospital bed. "Sir," he proposed, fixing his eyes on the nurse instead of on the thing propped up in bed, "I've found that the _Champ_ needs another trial run. Her controls aren't properly calibrated for close work among the planets." "The devil you say!" Hans rose painfully on one elbow. "I calibrated them myself." "There's an error of half a degree in the...." "I know, dumbkopf. It won't bother us when we move against those S. P. tubs. Leave well enough alone; I can't make such a trip again. And I don't trust a single one of you congenital doublecrossers out of my sight. Now get back to work. I'm busy." He turned almost blindly to a mass of bloodstained papers spread over the bed. 6 A week later the word spread like lightning through the lab. Hans had died, screaming. His screams were not due to pain. (Radiation burns are almost painless.) They were torn out of him by the knowledge that he could not live to direct the test of strength with United Stars. The cream of the jest was that, as the director breathed his last, word was flashed from Nirvana that the duel would begin "somewhere in space" at 2400 sideral time, July 14--just three days away. Carlos called a war council immediately after the funeral. Present were Fritz, previously the second mate; the radiation-scarred chief engineer; two shifty-eyed deck officers; Greta, and Frank. "I don't understand these orders," the Spaniard raged, twisting his moustache as if trying to tear it out by the roots. "They tell me to blast off at 2400, but they don't name the battle area. This is another New Washington trick. Do they expect me to search the universe for those confounded Space Patrol tubs?"