"I'll inspect this conspiracy a little better after I find out how it's working," Patricia whispered to Billy. "You treat them both like sisters." "Tania has lived next door to us for most of her life," said Billy honestly. "Hm-m-m--girlhood sweet-heart?" "Nope. We didn't even scrap over the back fence." "There's one thing about Billy," said Downing, diverting his attention briefly. "He doesn't ever scrap for anything." "He never seems to lose anything he wants," offered Tania. "He doesn't," affirmed Lane. "Trouble is with that kind of guy, he'll never win the Solar Citation. Billy, why in the name of sin don't you make something look hard, just for once." "I claimed that any man who could spend a couple of months as referee between you two would have a job big enough to win the Solar Citation," said Patricia. "He made a breeze of it," said Lane, and Downing nodded and added: "Every time we got to the shooting-point, Billy was there with a crisis to solve, a mission to perform, or a detail to handle. And when the rivet-cutting really got going, he thought of the one short statement that stopped us both--cold." "I still say getting in between you two is bravery above the consideration of personal safety, or even the safety of any individual, for the benefit of mankind. If that doesn't rate a Solar Cit, I don't know what does." Billy grinned brazenly. "It all comes of one idea," he told them. "And that's the little proposition of making the best of what you know. I--know people. So I can make 'em tick. I'll admit it, I'm brilliant. Now let's forget my obvious touch of genius and go somewhere and try out our own individual superiority against a steak. We'll weigh the remains and the largest leavings is a loser." From the front steps, Co-ordinator Kennebec called: "A good idea, fellows. I was about to call out the Guard. I was beginning to think that a mass meeting was going on right on the Presidential Grounds." They waved good-by, and drove off in Billy Thompson's car. And it was about four o'clock in the morning that Hotang Lu retired after hours of discussion with Kennebec. The co-ordinator of the Solar Combine nodded the Little One to his door, and then decided to raid the presidential icebox. He stopped at the door. * * * * * Co-ordinator Kennebec had a large and healthy respect for Patricia's judgment, though she was but a youngster according to his standards and those of his contemporaries. Perhaps the combination of Irish impulsiveness with the Canadian-Scotch horse sense had resulted in something with a better grasp on human nature--or perhaps it was that still-unknown intuition that women all claimed. Anyway, Kennebec had been talking to Hotang Lu with four tenths of an ear cocked to the doorway. He'd wanted to get Pat's side of the details. He'd missed her, apparently.