He was dumbfounded. Sex was not forbidden to Church of the Emancipation girls, but usually at the merest hint of it they ran away and hid somewhere. For a moment, remembering the sweep of her thighs when she had entered the room, he was tempted; but only for a moment. Recovering himself, he said, "I'm afraid that kind of cash won't suffice either. My pilot's license is my bread and butter, and I value my bread and butter highly." He stood up. "In my capacity as captain of this vessel I hereby place you under arrest and order you to return to your self-chosen quarters and to remain there for the duration of this voyage." Disbelief darkened her wide-apart brown eyes. Then golden motes of anger came and chased the darkness away. She made a wild grab for the ion gun on the table. He thwarted her easily, seized her arm and, towering above her, escorted her out of the cabin and down the companionway to the starboard storeroom. The starboard storeroom adjoined the hull, and in common with all hull compartments, it was equipped with a lock instead of a door. After shoving Saint Annabelle Leigh inside, he adjusted the sealing mechanism so that the lock could be opened only from the outside, then he turned to go. She ran forward and caught his arm. There was desperation in her brown eyes. "_Please_ put me down on Iago Iago." He freed his arm, stepped out into the corridor, and closed the lock behind him. An hour later, his ship passed through a Lambda-Xi field. * * * * * At least Drake thought it was a Lambda-Xi field. Certainly its effect upon himself and the _Fly by Night_ fitted the hypothetical description given in section 3, chapter 9 of _The Pilot's Handbook_--a prose-work which all spacemen were required to know by heart. The bulkheads "shimmered"; the artificial atmosphere took on a "haze-like aspect"; the deck "desolidified". As for Drake himself, he experienced a "painful prickling of nerve-ends and a slight vertigo". Then translucence--"the prelude to total disintegration" came to ship and master alike. The handbook went on to state that in view of the fact that no one had ever passed through a Lambda-Xi field and survived, all knowledge pertaining to the preliminary effects of such a passage had had to be extrapolated. It then added reassuringly that since such fields were exceedingly rare, the danger they represented was virtually negligible. The handbook said nothing, however, about any handwriting on the wall. Handwriting there was, though, just the same. Standing in his ship, through the translucent bulkheads and hull of which he could make out the stars, Drake read the single word: DEATH. And yet death did not come. Neither did total disintegration--if a distinction can be drawn. The _Fly by Night_ went right on being translucent, and so did Nathaniel Drake.