Farrell was interrupted by the insistent call on the Station intercom for Don Channing. Don went to his office to find the Terran beam awaiting his presence. He lifted the phone and identified himself. "This is P. L. Hughes of the Interplanetary Criminal Office," came the answer. "I didn't do it," grinned Channing. "Besides, I gotta alibi." "O.K.," came the amused answer. "No use talking then." "Just a minute," said Don. "I might as well know what I'm being suspected of. Whom have I murdered?" "No one, yet. Look, Channing, we're having a time here." "What kind?" "Phony money." "So?" "Yes. The trouble is that it isn't phony. You can always detect spurious coinage and counterfeit bills by some means or another. We have bits of nita-fluorescin in the bills that is printed into the paper in a pattern which is symbolically keyed to the issue-date, the serial number, and the identifying marks on the face of the bill. It takes a bit of doing to duplicate the whole shooting-match, but we've been getting stuff that we know is phony--but, Channing, having the original and the duplicate here on my desk I can't tell which is which!" "Give me more." "I have a hundred dollar bill here--two of them in fact. They are absolutely alike. They are both bona fide, as far as I or my men can tell from very complete analysis, right down to the bits of stuff that gets ground into a bill from much handling. I have coinage the same way. Isn't there something that can be done?" "We are trying to find a substance that can not be duplicated," explained Channing. "Given time, we will. Until then, I'm helpless." "What do you suggest?" "I don't know. I've been hoping that we could control the situation until something sensible could be worked out. It slipped out of hand. I'd suggest that you stop operations because of the absolute impossibility of keeping your thumb on things. I'd forget the counterfeiting angle entirely and start building up a force to guard against riots, mob rules and minor, inter-community warfare." "I think you're right," said Hughes, and Channing knew that the head of the Interplanetary Criminal Office was nodding his head. Channing hung up the telephone and toyed with three copies of the judge's watch that were keeping identical time. He shook his head and wondered how it was all going to end. * * * * * Conversion from production line to duplicator came all over the Solar System in about ten days. Terran Electric's own staff fabricated a duplicator capable of handling an object the size of a locomotive, and plant-sized duplicators were formed, one after the other on flat cars that rolled through the maw of the huge machine. For payment, Terran Electric accepted blocks of stock in the purchasing companies, and the wealth and holdings of Terran Electric mounted high and began to look like the major company that would ultimately control all merchandising and manufacture in the System.