"Thanks," Nick told him quietly. "But we prefer to do everything alone." Our visitor shrugged, standing there at the door of his space boat. "Okay," he breezed. "Get in touch with me, if you feel you need me!" Some hours later, a radiogram came through from Earth. "_Congratulations!_" it read. "_Stick to your guns! I like people with imagination. Maybe I'll be back in harness soon myself.--Art Haynes._" * * * * * "He's probably just being sarcastic," I said bitterly. "Old devil!" Pa Mavrocordatus growled. Two men were killed just thirty minutes after the message was received. A little thin-faced fellow named Sparr did it. But he got away in a space boat before we could catch him. A paid killer and trouble maker. The incident put our crew more on edge than before. A half dozen of the newcomers--mechanics from Earth--quit abruptly. Our food was almost gone. We got another shipload in, but the growing unrest didn't abate, though we kept on for another month. There was similar trouble on 439, where the Mavrocordatus money came from. But maybe we'd make the grade, anyway. We had a pretty dense atmosphere already, on Paradise Asteroid. The black sky had turned blue now. The ground was moist with water. Earthly buildings were going up. Pa Mavrocordatus had had seeds and small trees and things planted. It was that deceptive moment of success, before the real blow came. After sunset one night, I heard shots. I raced out of the barracks, Geedeh, Irene, and Pa Mavrocordatus following me. We all carried blast tubes. We found Nick in a gorge, his body half burned through, just above his right hip. But he was still alive. He had a blast tube in one hand. Two men lay on the rocks and earth in front of him, dead. Beside them, glinting in our flashlight beams, was an aluminum cylinder. "It's a bacteria culture container, Chet," Nick whispered. "They had me caught, and they bragged a little before I did some fast moving, and got one of their blast tubes. Venutian Black-Rot germs. They were going to dump them in the drinking water supply. They mentioned--Haynes...." Nick couldn't say much more than that. But he'd saved our lives. He died there in my arms, a hero to progress, a little breeze in the new atmosphere he'd helped to create rumpling his curly hair. He'd died for his dream of beauty and betterment. Poor little Irene couldn't even cry. Her face was white, and she was stricken mute. Her pa was shaken by great sobs, and he babbled threats. I told him to shut up. Geedeh cursed in his own language, his voice a soft, deadly hiss, his little fists clenching and unclenching. "Too bad Nick had to kill these men!" I growled. "We could have made 'em talk. We'd have evidence. The law would take care of Norman Haynes!" "But we ain't got nothing!" Pa Mavrocordatus groaned. "Nothing!"