His hunch had hatched. After a moment, he said: "Harry is getting back from the target end of the tube now, Bill. He can't pick me up, so beetle it down to the tool room, get him, and get up to the workshop fast. If I'm not there, wait; I have a little prying to do." [Illustration] "Can do," said Griffin. He went toward the elevator at an easy lope. David MacHeath went in the opposite direction. * * * * * When MacHeath returned to the workshop which he had been assigned, Bill Griffin and Harry Benbow were waiting for him. Beside the big-muscled Griffin, Harry Benbow looked even thinner than he was. He was a good six-two, which made him a head taller than Griffin, but, unlike many tall, lean men, Benbow had no tendency to slouch; he stood tall and straight, reminding MacHeath of a poplar tree towering proudly over the countryside. Benbow was one of those rare American Negroes whose skin was actually as close to being "black" as human pigmentation will allow. His eyes were like disks of obsidian set in spheres of white porcelain, which gave an odd contrast-similarity effect when compared with Griffin's china-blue eyes. If the average man had wanted to pick two human beings who were "opposites," he could hardly have made a better choice than Benbow and the short, thickly-built, blond-haired, pink-skinned Bill Griffin. But the average man would be so struck by the differences that he would never notice that the similarities were vastly more important. "You look as if you'd just been kissed by Miss America," Harry said as MacHeath came through the door. "Better than that," MacHeath said. "We've got work to do." "What's the pitch?" Griffin wanted to know. "Well, in the first place, I'm afraid Dr. Konrad Bern is no longer of any use to the Redford Project. We're going to have to arrest him as an unregistered agent of the Soviet Government." "It's just as well," said Harry Benbow gently. "His research hasn't done us any good and it hasn't done the Soviets any good. The poor guy's been on edge ever since he got here. All the pale hide around this place stirs up every nerve in him." "What got you onto this?" Griffin asked MacHeath. "A hunch first," MacHeath said. "Then I got data to back it up. But, first ... Harry, how'd you know about Bern's reactions? He keeps those prejudices of his down pretty deep; I didn't think you could go that far." "I didn't have to. He spent half an hour talking to me this morning. He was so happy to see a fellow human being--according to his definition of human being--that he was as easy to read as if _you_ were doing the reading." MacHeath nodded. "I hate to throw him to the wolves, but he's got to go." "What was the snooping you said you had to do?" Griffin asked.