A screwball gent, this Biggs. Tall, angular, inconceivably skinny, graced (or disfigured?) with a phenomenally active Adam's-apple that bobbed eternally up and down in his skinny throat like an unswallowed cud--but blessed with two saving graces. A swell sense of humor and a _brain_! True, his thought processes were oftimes fantastically involved. His motto, "Get the theory first!" sometimes led him down dark passageways of logic. But there never was a problem too deep for him; time and again his screwy logic had saved the personnel of the _Saturn_ from peril to person or purse. So, "That's swell!" I said--and meant it. Then I stared at the skipper thoughtfully. "But why," I asked him, "tell me about it? Biggs is the man to tell." Hanson's eyes clouded, and he gnawed savagely at a grubby fingernail. "That's just it, Sparks. I can't tell him." "Why?" I demanded. "Laryngitis? Or ain't you and him speaking?" "I can't tell him," explained the skipper, "because it would be unethical. You see, when a man's bein' examined for his commander's stripes, he ain't supposed to know about it. That's why Cooper come aboard under an alias. He wants to watch Lanse perform his routine duties in routine fashion--like nothin' unusual was goin' on. "Then, at the end of the trip, he'll tell Lanse who he is, give him a verbal exam on the Space Safety Code, navigation practices, etcetera an' so on, an'--there you are!" "There," I agreed, "I am. So where am I? Still in the dark, Skipper. Why tell _me_?" Hanson glared at me witheringly. "If you was as deaf," he said, making noises like a sizzling steak, "as you are dumb, the Corporation might give me a new radio operator for this here jallop--I mean, ship! Look, stupid! Biggs had ought to know he's bein' watched by an examiner, shouldn't he? Not that he don't know how to do things right, but because--well, because every so often the boy gets whacky ideas an' starts tryin' experiments. "An' we don't want him tryin' nothin' like that, do we? Not on this shuttle. So, bein' as how you're his chum, an' since it would be unethical for _me_ to spill the beans--_you've_ got to tell him. Warn him to lay off the nonsense--get it?" I got it. I nodded. "Okay, Skipper. You're right and I'm wrong, as you usually are. I'll warn him. Only--" I hesitated, and the Old Man halted with one hand on the doorknob, looked back at me impatiently. "Only what?" "Only--if it's supposed to be a deep, dark secret, wouldn't it be unethical for _me_ to tell him, too?" "Don't," snorted Hanson, "be a donkey, Sparks! Whoever heard of a radioman with a sense of honor? Get word to him. An' make it snappy, too. He comes on in half an hour, an' I don't want he should pull any boners in front of Cooper. G'bye, now!" The door slammed behind him. * * * * *