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Updated: June 20, 2025
He'd either have made a deal with Tawney or let him hijack the lode, if that was all there was to it. But there's still one big question ... where did he hide what he found? And we aren't going to find the answer here." He walked over to the hole in the wall. "Made quite a mess of it, didn't it?" Johnny said. "Looks like it. I wonder what that thing would do to a ship's generator plant."
Our own engineers found nothing but low grade ore on any of them." "Still, it might be fun to look." "It could be very expensive fun. Asteroid mining is a dangerous business, even for experts. For amateurs...." Tawney spread his hands. "Accidents occur...." "Yes, we've heard about those accidents," Greg said coldly. "I don't think we're quite ready to sell, Mr. Tawney.
With it, and with the advantage of a ghost that walked like a man ... Tom Hunter, to be exact ... they had reduced the Jupiter Equilateral orbit-ship to a smoking wreck in something less than thirty minutes. The signal came back that a scout-ship was ready, unguarded. Johnny prodded Tawney with the stunner. "You first," he said. "But where are you taking me?" "You'll see," Johnny said.
"But what can we do?" "Start bluffing." "It seems to me we're just about bluffed out." "I mean talk business," Johnny said. "Tell Tawney what he wants to know." "When we don't know any more than he does? How?" Johnny Coombs scratched his jaw. "I've been thinking about that," he said slowly, "and I wonder if we don't know a whole lot more than we think we do." "Like what?" Greg said.
And when we landed, they let Tawney drive off without even questioning him." "The least we could do, under the circumstances," the Major said. "Well, I'd like to know why," Greg broke in bitterly. "Why pick on us? We've just been telling you...." "Yes, yes, I heard every word of it," the Major sighed. "If you knew the trouble ... oh, what's the use?
Call the port on a scrambled line and tell them to stand by with a ship on emergency call, with a crack interceptor pilot ready to go. Then get me the plotted orbits of every eccentric asteroid that's crossed Mars' orbit in the last two months. And double-A security on everything ... we don't want to let Tawney get wind of this...."
"All right, it was a mistake," Tawney snapped. "What was he supposed to do, let him get back to Mars? We've got a good front there, but it's not that good. If the United Nations gets a toehold out here, the whole Belt will go into their pocket, you realize that. They're waiting for us to make one slip." He paused, and Tom heard him pacing the compartment. "But I think we've got our boy.
The captain looked around the cabin, then saw Tawney, and took a deep breath. "Well, thank the stars you're safe at any rate. Pete, Jimmy, take the controls." "Hold on," Greg said. "We don't need a pilot." The Captain looked at him. "Sorry, but we're taking you in. There won't be any trouble unless you make it. You three are under arrest, and I'm authorized to make it stick if I have to.
At Stapleford Tawney, just named, a native, the first I had seen for a mile or two, stopped at the unwonted sight of a stranger sketching in the churchyard, and I consulted him as to application of the parable of the Good Samaritan in the case under notice. His reply was that, though he had lived there "man and boy for fifty year," he had "never see'd the thing afore."
In the hatchway to the after-cabin, Merrill Tawney was standing, with a smile on his lips and a Markheim stunner trained directly on Major Briarton's chest. The Final Move "I realize I'm much earlier than you expected, Major. You did a very neat job of camouflaging your takeoff ... we were almost fooled ... and no doubt the dummy ship you sent off later got full fanfare.
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