Dusty Britton, no matter what else, was a good actor any time he could sit in with a large Virginia Ham to carve. Dusty would never play Hamlet or Julius Caesar; a custard pie in the face was closer to Dusty's art than John Barrymore. This fact provided for Dusty a rather interesting background for the present argument. A student of science could not have faced Gant Nerley without paying deference to the Marandanian's obviously superior knowledge, position and experience. The learned man makes no flat-footed statements; this leads to the odd belief that most learned men are not entirely sure of themselves. It is the bird who is ignorant of all the myriad things that he does not know that can afford to stand up on his hind feet and reel off chapter and verse as though there could be no rebuttal. * * * * * So Dusty Britton, who could portray a reasonably convincing role of a wounded hero while mentally contemplating how long it would be before the first preprandial martini, plus being the flamboyant type who never lets a few facts stop his flow of words, was not abashed to let on that he knew a lot more than the Marandanian suspected. Furthermore, Dusty felt that he had Gant Nerley on the defensive, and if he could put the Marandanian off balance long enough to accomplish something, Dusty did not care if Nerley accused him of being a four-flusher at some later date. Keeping this in mind, Dusty braced himself with little effort and tried to reduce to bafflegab what he recalled of Scyth Radnor's previous statements. "Interstellar travel is, of course, based upon obvious errors in the theoretical mathematics of general relativity," said Dusty, as though he were reciting some of the science-double-talk usually included in Dusty Britton And The Space Patrol. "Of the many schools of thought which have their own theories on how to explain these obvious errors, the group-velocity field seems to be the most successful. But all of them are seeking some evidence to support their theories, and a couple of them, namely the gravitic and the magnetic-field proponents claim that such evidence has already supported their claim. Now, if such is the case, you know it will not be long before some practical experiment will disprove the illogic of providing a finite limit to an infinite system. Once this has been established it seems obvious that star-travel is the next step." "Hmmm--I see. This is a situation that must be considered more carefully. May I ask, Dusty Britton, what is your position in your society?" "I am Dusty Britton of The Space Patrol," said Dusty with the proper tone of respect. "Commander in Chief of the Junior Division." "Indeed! A real Space Patrol!" Dusty nodded at the viewscreen. "It may be a bit ambitious," he remarked with even more deference, carefully studied. "But we feel that there is small point in using a conservative name and then having to change it every couple of years."