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Updated: May 3, 2025
I now asked a series of indirect questions which led me to believe that neither Hargrib nor his master knew of the thing I had been conscious of from the start that we had aboard the ship an amount of high explosive sufficient to do ghastly damage not only to this section of the coast but to the whole planet of Orcon.
I concluded that we had missed an unpleasant fate by a narrow margin. Quickly Hargrib confirmed our belief that it was Leider who had wrecked our ship while it was still approaching Orcon through space. A ray which had crippled the magnogravitos had been used.
Although it was he who had sent word from headquarters that we were to be destroyed, he had not paused to attend to the matter himself. Hargrib thought, however, that the failure of the cable party might change this attitude, and expressed the belief that Leider would interview us now before he put us out of the way.
"So far as I can see," I said quickly, "Leider hasn't armed his guards with any unique weapon, but has merely left them to watch us. And the Orconites don't know how to fight! Think of the ease with which I got away with Hargrib last night. When it comes to dealing destruction with scientific weapons, their power is appalling. When it comes to a slugging match, they are only so many sheep.
Some of the Orconites would surely go with us, and in that case it would be next to impossible to get at the kotomite properly. What we need is at least a couple of minutes which will be uninterrupted. We'll leave Hargrib right where he is, and get access to the ship in another way. We'll fight for it!" "Fight?" Captain Crane shot a glance at me, and I saw that the idea appealed to her.
They saw, I think, that I was planning something, and we retreated together, with the result that the Orconites ceased to threaten and once more fell back to the walls of the cavern. Their captain flew over and joined them. "I thought for a moment," I said, "that we might tell the captain that Hargrib was locked up in the ship, and so furnish an excuse to get aboard. But that isn't good.
"We'll lock him up in one of the staterooms, and after that we'll see if we can't get busy with something that will at least help Earth, even if it doesn't help us." Hargrib, still terrified by those radio sounds he could not stand, made no protest when I ordered him into the stateroom which had belonged to the ship's second officer, and we were rid of him in a moment.
I decided that I was in Leider's headquarters, a closely guarded prisoner. It was to be supposed that Leider had brought us here, as Hargrib had said he might, to interview us before he finished us off. Fear for the others laid hold of me, but I was still too dazed and giddy to get up and look for them. I lay still, trying to remember everything.
Also it was plain that Hargrib, now he had been cornered, would hold nothing back because he believed we would never live long enough to make trouble, regardless of what information we gained. To state the rest of it briefly, we learned that Leider had come to Orcon immediately after his defeat at Calypsus.
I gathered, however, that Leider suspected we were armed against him in some way, and would watch us carefully. By now daylight had begun to peer in through the ports, a greenish daylight which grew out of the north, and with its coming I resolved on a plan of action. "I am done with Hargrib," I said suddenly to Captain Crane.
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