"I'm not looking forward to the Little Death!" Murdock said dryly, and returned his eye to the scanner. Saxon leaned back in the acceleration chair. The captain was bending over the three-dimensional space-charts along with the third mate. A spaceman stood at the robot pilot. Another, whom Murdock had replaced at the scanner, was reclining in a second acceleration chair. There was an air of tension in the control room. Saxon realized suddenly that the captain was checking the robot controls. That could mean only one thing. It was nearing time for Villainowski to switch the _Shooting Star_ onto the stellar drive. They would be going into the Little Death any moment. Saxon sat up abruptly. "How long before we switch over, Captain?" The captain looked up from the charts. "We've attained minimum velocity. Villainowski's in the engine room now. I'm expecting orders to turn her over right away." Murdock turned from the scanner again, fixed Saxon with his pale blue eyes. "By the way, Jon, you've been prowling the ship from stem to stern the past three days." His voice was pitched too low to reach the officers checking the star maps and robot controls. "Have you a line on Q62 yet?" Saxon could read suspicion in the T.I.S. agent's mind. "No," he admitted, "and I'm more puzzled than you. Ileth doesn't know who Q62 is, or even if he's aboard, although she's been commanded by General Atomic to take her orders from him." "You're sure of that?" "Yes. I'm sure of it." There was a pause, each man busy with his own thoughts. "I'd swear," Saxon broke the silence, "that Q62 isn't aboard, nor any other General Atomic agents." Murdock regarded him speculatively and Saxon caught his thought, "_What the hell makes him so damned sure?_" * * * * * Sure? Saxon thought to himself. He wasn't sure about anything. The alien stowaway was still aboard. His sixth sense had warned him of her nearness a hundred times during his sporadic jaunts about the ship. But he had been unable to establish contact with her. He had kept his mind open to the wash of thoughts from crew and staff, but, so far as he had been able to learn, they were all loyal to Government. Not even in their secret innermost thoughts had he discovered any evidence that a traitor was aboard. Murdock interrupted his reflections, asking, "Have you any idea what that N.P.A. had discovered before he died?" Saxon started, looked at the T.I.S. agent uncomfortably. Murdock's irrelevant question had conjured a vivid picture in his mind of the death of the N.P.A. in Villainowski's office. "I don't know," he said miserably, beginning to understand how uncomfortable the Little Death might be. "I would give a lot to know. He may have had a clue to what I am." Murdock's cold blue eyes narrowed, and he regarded Saxon with a peculiar intensity. "_That's a devilish odd way for him to put it_," the T.I.S. agent was thinking. "_What he is! Now why the hell would he say that?_"