A week is never long at best,--and this had been shorter than most, Fiske decided as he picked up a ground car at fleet headquarters and directed the driver to take him to his quarters. It was a little better than an hour until blastoff, which would give him time enough to pick up his kit and say goodbye, to Ellen for the fourth time. He'd been lucky. The "Dauntless" needed modification and repair and the week planetside was his longest time ashore since his honeymoon. Of course, Ellen wasn't going to like his sudden departure, but she was a Navy wife and she knew what she was getting into before they were married. It was an abiding wonder that she had married him in the face of his Cassandra prophecies of trouble and heartache. But then--Ellen was an unusual woman. As he left the forbidding grimness of Fleet Headquarters he almost smiled. In a way it was a relief to get away from the long-faced brass whose professionally preoccupied air was merely a camouflage for the worry that ate at the linings of their stomachs. Fiske was glad that he wasn't one of the Ulcer Echelon, that his worries involved relatively simple things such as fighting a ship and getting home alive. As it was, the pain of leaving again was bad enough, and if it weren't for Ellen's "get-togethers" it would be greater. They were the one fault in her otherwise perfect character. How a perfectly sane and sensible woman could endure those gabfests where every blessed female was talking at the same time was more than he could understand. But Ellen not only took them in her stride, she took them three or four times a week. His face clouded as he saw the squadron of ground cars parked before his quarters. Their significance was obvious. Of course, she didn't expect him home this early in the day, and if she'd known of the orders he'd received there probably would have been no one here but her. Still, he'd have to go inside and face that crowd of cats mewling at each other over some conversational bone. He sighed as he stepped out of the car, told the driver to wait, and walked the few steps to his quarters. Through the clatter of shrill voices the squealing giggle of Anne Albertson cut like a knife, piercing his ears as he stood in the tiny entrance hall, reluctant to enter farther yet unwilling to leave. He winced. Sure, Anne probably had a right to squeal. Her husband had landed his riddled ship yesterday morning and had walked away from the wreckage. Sure--she had a right to squeal, but did she have to do it in his house?