"We managed to get two good sketches of the gadget--at least, as much of it as that Russian lady scientist has put together so far. I kind of like the rather abstract effect you get from all those wires snaking in and around, with that green glass tube in the center. Pretty, isn't it?" [Illustration] "Very," said the colonel without conviction. "I wonder if it will help Davenport any?" He looked at the pictures for several seconds more, then, suddenly, his eyes narrowed. "Lenny--this piece of green glass--the thing's shaped like the letter Q." "Yeah, sort of. Why?" "You said it was a tube, but you didn't make it look hollow when you drew it." "It isn't; it's solid. Does a tube have to be hollow? Yeah, I guess it does, doesn't it? Well, then, it isn't a tube." Colonel Spaulding picked up the phone and dialed a number. "Colonel Spaulding here," he said after a moment. "Let me speak to Dr. Davenport." And, after a wait: "This is Colonel Spaulding, doctor. I think we may have something for you." "Good morning, colonel. I'm glad to hear that. What is it?" "The Q-shaped gadget--the one that you said was supposed to be painted emerald green. Are you _sure_ that's the right translation of the Russian?" "Well ... uh--" Davenport hesitated. "I can't be sure on my own say-so, of course. _I_ don't understand Russian. But I assure you that Mr. Berensky is perfectly reliable." "Oh, I have no doubt of that," Colonel Spaulding said easily. "But, tell me, does Mr. Berensky know how to read a circuit diagram?" "He does," Davenport said, somewhat testily. "Of course, he wasn't shown the diagram itself. We had the Russian labels copied, and he translated from a list." "I had a sneaking suspicion that was it," said Spaulding. "Tell me, doctor, what does L-E-A-D spell?" "Lead," said the doctor promptly, pronouncing it _leed_. Then, after a pause, he said: "Or lead," this time pronouncing it _led_. "It would depend on the context." "Suppose it was on a circuit diagram," the colonel prompted. "Then it would probably be _leed_. What's all this leading up to, colonel?" "Bear with me. Suppose you had a cable coming from a storage battery, and you wanted to make sure that the cable was reasonably resistant to corrosion, so you order it made out of the metal, lead. It would be a _led leed_, wouldn't it?" "Um-m-m ... I suppose so." "You might get pretty confused if you didn't have a circuit diagram in front of you to tell you what the label was talking about, mightn't you?" "I see what you mean," the scientist said slowly. "But we can't show those circuit diagrams to Berensky. The Secretary of Defense himself has classified them as Class Triple-A Ultra-Hyper Top Secret. That puts them just below the Burn-The-Contents-Before-Reading class, and Berensky doesn't have that kind of clearance."