satisfied his urge to distinguish himself as a gentleman scientist. Aside from Paul's brief connection with Carter's Troopers neither brother had shown any interest in Terran politics. * * * * * Rather poor prospects, but Dowland's information was that after a year and a half the better prospects were regarded as nearly exhausted, and hadn't produced the slightest results, putting the various divisions of the Interstellar Police Authority in the discouraging position of now having to suspect almost anybody. If there was no sign of Miguel Trelawney's presence here by sundown, he decided, he would move on to the next check point. Trelawney's pets would be cared for by automatic machinery; it might be several weeks before their owner showed up to look them over. His gaze shifted briefly around the plain out of which the mesa loomed. It was turbulent today; gusty winds shook the car and electric storms were boiling along the northern mountain ranges. Below, sand and dust whirled up the mesa's steep flanks. Picking up the hunting-scope again, Dowland began moving the visibeam almost at random and with low magnification over the back of the table-land. Dense masses of trees swept past, shouldered aside here and there by wind-scarred rock. A thoroughly wild place. He brought the glasses back to the ranch area, suddenly checked them there.... Somebody was in sight, moving toward the edge of the mesa nearest him. He caught a flash of something white. Centering carefully on the figure, Dowland turned on full magnification, and in the lenses, the image of a young woman appeared at close-up range. She had come to a stop; and for an instant Dowland was startled to realize she was peering back at him through a pair of binoculars. But lacking the visibeam of the IPA, her glasses couldn't, of course, do much more than show her there was a grid-car up there. Now her free hand lifted the long white cloth it was holding, and began swinging it in swift, vigorous gestures through the air above her head. In spite of the binoculars, Dowland was immediately sure of the woman's identity--having, in the past few days, studied a number of pictures of her. She was Jill Trelawney, the youngest of the three surviving members of the Trelawney Freeholders. Miguel and Paul were her uncles--and if she was here, one or the other of the men must certainly be here also. It was obvious that she was signaling to the car. Dowland glanced at the communicator in the panel before him, saw it was turned on but registering no local calls. His eyes narrowed with speculation. This suddenly looked just a little bit interesting. If the Trelawneys were expecting a visitor but preferred not to address him over the open communication system, it indicated that they intended to be hard to find. Which might mean a number of things of no interest at all to the IPA. But....