Copyright 1950, Century Publications...

Paul Grayson walked the city street slowly. He was sauntering towards the spaceport, but he was in no hurry. He had allowed himself plenty of time to breathe the fresh spring air, to listen to the myriad of sounds made by his fellow men, and to revel in the grand freedom that being out in the open gave him. Soon enough he would be breathing canned air, pungent with the odor of compressor oil and the tang of the greenery used to replenish the oxygen, unable to walk freely more than a few dozen st

The police car U-turned in the broad roadway and headed off to return Nora Phillips to her home and to pick up the officer set to sentry duty. Paul waved them off and then started to walk up the pavement towards the administration building. He was feeling better. Everything pleased him vastly. The knot inside of his head was gone, he had made the acquaintance of a very delectable armful of femininity, and now he had been chauffeured to the spaceport by none other than the City Police Department,

Paul Grayson awoke the following morning to the tune of the telephone beside his bed. "This is Sergeant Hollowell," said the other man, "I've just called to apologize once more and to tell you that everything is OK. We'll even give you a guard if you want it." Paul stretched and said, sleepily: "Thanks, Sergeant. I guess everything will come out all right without a guard." "Okay. I'm glad for all concerned. For your information and not to be repeated, the character we got last night is—was—a pet

Chadwick Haedaecker was the kind of man who collected college degrees, both earned and honorary, and had them lettered on his office door like a collection of trophies. He had enough ability and ambition to get to the top of his particular heap, and once he got there he had garnered enough additional power to stay there. He was a tall man with piercing eyes and an indomitable nature and he used both to quell any objectors to his plans, projects, ideas, and theories. Twenty years of authority in

"I'm pointing for Alpha Centauri," said Paul. "And so that's what we calculate for." Nora looked at the bays of neat equipment and shook her head. "Why not aim at it and run?" she asked. "Surely you do not need this billion dollars' worth of stuff to point out your destination." "We do," objected Paul. "You see, if I took off with my telescope pointed along the axis of drive with the cross-hairs pointing at Alpha Centauri, I'd be heading for the star where it was four years ago. I intend to be o

Buried in the loose, powdery dust that covered Proxima Centauri I, a spacecraft lay concealed. Ten miles across the blazing flatlands of dust, Galactic Survey Station I was clearly visible. From the station the spacecraft blended so well with the dust that it could not be seen. Only a sharp observer who knew where to look and what to look for could have seen the turret of the spacecraft lofting above the dusty plains. The long-barrelled machine rifle would have been invisible to the sharpest of

Ten days later when Paul's ship dropped out of the realm of invisibility, he was no nearer to the problem's solution. He did have a course of action formulated, however. So his first telephone call was not to Nora Phillips. It was to John Stacey, the detective. "I'm back." "Glad to hear it. Wha' hoppen?" "I've got a corpse on my ship." "Friend of yours?" "Nope." "Look," came the cheerful reply, "if you want to murder someone, go ahead. But there's no sense in putting yourself in jeopardy by carr

Stacey's voice was as dry as ever, "Busy, Paul?" "Just polishing up my talk," he said. "I'm due to lecture in an hour." "Well, don't be nervous." "I'd be less nervous if I knew what was going on." "This might help. First, your corpse was none other than a three-time loser named Clarke and a pot full of aliases, none of which are worth mentioning. As dead as a mackerel." "What are we going to do about him?" "It's been done." "How?" "Don't ask." "But isn't this disposing evidence?" "Sure. But if a

With a smile of self-confidence, Paul faced the cheering auditorium and gloried in the praise. It—this moment—was payment in plenty for years of struggle and of being a third-rate voice crying against the stone wall of authority. He took their cries of praise with a deferent attitude, but remained on the podium, which indicated that he had more to tell. They subsided after minutes of wild applause, and Paul continued: "Across the galaxy between here and Neosol," he said, waving a hand which caus

There is something about a pair of handcuffs far above and beyond the mere chaining of wrist to wrist. Mobility is not decreased, and the flailing of hands against an enemy is not greatly impaired. But the idea of being manacled presents a condition in psychology of complete defeat. In completely bewildered defeat, Paul Grayson looked down at the chromium handcuffs with an air of blankness. John Stacey—Z-wave—Nora Phillips— The policeman led Paul Grayson from the hall amid a complete quietness.

Considering that the time elapsed between Paul's first contact with Nora Phillips and his meeting with Hoagland was less than one month, during which Paul lived in an incomprehensible maelstrom, the following ten months were sheer boredom. For Paul was removed from 7111 Bridge Street and taken aboard a spacecraft bound for Neoterra, one hundred and forty light years by distance and three hundred and eighteen days by the fastest spaceliner going. Ten months plus, spent in a shell of metal, comple

Nine days had passed according to the Solar clock on Paul's instrument panel. Nine days with the air slowly becoming stale. It was beginning to smell a bit, now. Paul did not notice it particularly, but someone just in from a planetary atmosphere would say that the air reeked to high heaven. His senses were beginning to numb. This was not a fast death, but slow and sordid. Paul yawned constantly, and took deep heaving gulps of air only to try again. Paul fought sleep. He fought it because he kne

Latham's Triplets, Alpha, Beta, and Gamma, were at the corners of an equilateral triangle about a quarter of a light year on a side. Beta III was a small planet possessed of a somewhat odorous atmosphere that was unpleasant but not deadly by any means. Beta III was not capable of supporting human life—if by 'supporting' is meant that the planet shall be called upon to accept, foster, and maintain in growing population a colony from Terra without outside assistance. A dearth of light metals on Be

Like most human beings, Paul could comprehend the actions of someone of his own type. But he could not understand the mental machinations of people who had other motives and other interests in life. Nor could he seem to make other people understand that his continued interest in the Z-wave was only just and sensible. After all, he had never had an opportunity to try it. To Paul it was just that simple. Just let him try it. He had so much faith in it that he could not foresee his next reaction if

Once in space and safely away—Paul gloated that the former captors were without spacecraft now—he stopped the flight of the ship and spent a couple of hours making some course-calculations. The return to Latham's Triplets was jerky because he was uncertain of the distance and so they made it in five approximations, ending up finally with only a few hours to go for landing. Paul's first interest was his laboratory set-up. There had been plenty of time for the three-way hookup to be established, a

For four solid months, Al Donatti tried to reply by Z-wave and failed. This was because Grayson was busy following the radio beacon between Latham Alpha and the next Galactic Survey station along the network. Because of daily contact and a certain amount of quavering faith, no one dared to retune the Z-wave dials. Paul and Nora followed the beacon in almost to the station. Then, because Paul did not know that he had already established contact across a myriad of relay connections all the way bac

The courier spacecraft dropped down out of supervelocity and emitted an overwhelming blast of radio signal. One half of the output tube operating life went into Eternity in one half minute of intense power. Minutes later space stations picked up the radio blast and had radiogoniometers pointing the angle; which when correlated with other space stations bracketed the courier spacecraft nicely. A telemeter beam fingered out and caught the radio-controlled circuits of the courier and the courier tu