He breathed air. He kept his ship warm enough for me. When he wasn"t in a hurry, he cruised at one gee, near enough. He used lighting that suited my eyes. Therefore he came from the sort of planet I came from.

Proxima Centauri is a double star, as you know if you do crossword puzzles, and one is a twin for our own Sun-size, temperature, special pattern. Is it a fair guess that it has a planet like Earth? I had a dirty hunch that I knew Wormface"s home address.

I knew where he didn"t come from. Not from a planet that runs a couple of centuries in utter airlessness with temperatures pushing absolute zero, followed by a "summer" in which some gases melt but water is solid rock and even Wormface has to wear a s.p.a.ce suit. Nor from anywhere in our system, for I was sure as taxes that Wormface felt at home only on a planet like ours. Never mind the way he looked; spiders don"t look like us but they like the things we like-there must be a thousand spiders in our houses for every one of us.

Wormface and his kin would like Earth. My fear was that they liked it too much.

I looked at that Proxima Centauri problem and saw something else. The turn-over speed read 1,110,000 miles per second, six times the speed of light. Relativity theory says that"s impossible.

I wanted to talk to Dad about it. Dad reads everything from The Anatomy of Melancholy to Acta Mathematica and Paris-Match and will sit on a curbstone separating damp newspapers wrapped around garbage in order to see continued-on-page-eight. Dad would haul down a book and we"d look it up. Then he would try four or five more with other opinions. Dad doesn"t hold with the idea that it-must-be-true-or-they-wouldn"t-have-printed-it; he doesn"t consider any opinion sacred-it shocked me the first time he took out a pen and changed something in one of my math books.

Still, even if speed-of-light was a limit, four or five years wasn"t impossible, or even impractical. We"ve been told for so long that star trips, even to the nearest stars, would take generations that we may have a wrong slant. A mile of lunar mountains is a long way but a trillion miles in empty s.p.a.ce may not be.

But what was Wormface doing on Pluto?

If you were invading another solar system, how would you start? I"m not joking; a dungeon on Pluto is no joke and I never laughed at Wormface. Would you just barge in, or toss your hat in first? They seemed far ahead of us in engineering but they couldn"t have known that ahead of time. Wouldn"t it be smart to build a supply base in that system in some spot n.o.body ever visited?

Then you could set up advance bases, say on an airless satellite of a likely-looking planet, from which you could scout the surface of the target planet. If you lost your scouting base, you would pull back to main base and work out a new attack.

Remember that while Pluto is a long way off to us, it was only five days from Luna for Wormface. Think about World War II, back when speeds were slow. Main Base is safely out of reach (U.S.A./Pluto) but only about five days from advance base (England/The Moon) which is three hours from theater-of-operations (France-Germany/Earth). That"s a slow way to operate but it worked for the Allies in World War II.

I just hoped it would not work for Wormface"s gang.

Though I didn"t see anything to prevent it.

Somebody chucked down another can-spaghetti and meat b.a.l.l.s. If it had been canned peaches, I might not have had the fort.i.tude to do what I did next, which was to use it for a hammer before I opened it. I beat an empty can into a flat narrow shape and beat a point on it, which I sharpened on the edge of the catch basin. When I was through, I had a dagger -not a good one, but it made me feel less helpless.

Then I ate. I felt sleepy and went to sleep in a warm glow. I was still a prisoner but I had a weapon of sorts and I believed that I had figured out what I was up against. Getting a problem a.n.a.lyzed is two-thirds of solving it. I didn"t have nightmares.

The next thing tossed down the hole was Fats.

Skinny landed on him seconds later. I backed off and held my dagger ready. Skinny ignored me, picked himself up, looked around, went to the water spout and got a drink. Fats was in no shape to do anything; his breath was knocked out.

I looked at him and thought what a nasty parcel he was. Then I thought, oh, what the deuce!-he had ma.s.saged me when I needed it. I heaved him onto his stomach and began artificial respiration. In four or five pushes his motor caught and he was able to breathe. He gasped, "That"s enough!"

I backed off, got my knife out. Skinny was sitting against a wall, ignoring us. Fats looked at my feeble weapon and said, "Put that away, kid. We"re bosom buddies now."

"We are?"

"Yeah. Us human types had better stick together." He sighed wretchedly. "After all we done for him! That"s grat.i.tude."

"What do you mean?" I demanded.

"Huh?" said Fats. "Just what I said. He decided he could do without us. So Annie doesn"t live here any more."

"Shaddap," the skinny one said flatly.

Fats screwed his face into a pout. "You shaddap," he said peevishly. "I"m tired of that. It"s shaddap here, shaddap there, all day long-and look where we are."

"Shaddap, I said."

Fats shut up. I never did find out what had happened, because Fats seldom gave the same explanation twice. The older man never spoke except for that tiresome order to shut up, or in monosyllables even less helpful. But one thing was clear: they had lost their jobs as a.s.sistant gangsters, or fifth columnists, or whatever you call a human being who would stooge against his own race. Once Fats said, "Matter of fact, it"s your fault."

"Mine?" I dropped my hand to my tin-can knife.

"Yours. If you hadn"t b.u.t.ted in, he wouldn"t have got sore."

"I didn"t do anything."

"Says you. You swiped his two best prizes, that"s all, and held him up when he planned to high-tail it back here." "Oh. But that wasn"t your fault."

"So I told him. You try telling him. Take your hand away from that silly nail file." Fats shrugged. "Like I always say, let bygones be bygones."

I finally learned the thing I wanted most to know. About the fifth time I brought up the matter of Peewee, Fats said, "What d"you want to know about the brat for?"

"I just want to know whether she"s alive or dead."

"Oh, she"s alive. Leastwise she was last time I seen her."

"When was that?"

"You ask too many questions. Right here."

"She"s here?" I said eagerly.

"That"s what I said, wasn"t it? Around everywhere and always underfoot. Living like a princess, if you ask me." Fats picked his teeth and frowned. "Why he should make a pet out of her and treat us the way he did, beats me. It ain"t right."

I didn"t think so, either, but for another reason. The idea that gallant little Peewee was the spoiled darling of Wormface I found impossible to believe. There was some explanation-or Fats was lying. "You mean he doesn"t have her locked up?"

"What"s it get him? Where"s she gonna go?"

I pondered that myself. Where could you go?-when to step outdoors was suicide. Even if Peewee had her s.p.a.ce suit (and that, at least, was probably locked up), even if a ship was at hand and empty when she got outside, even if she could get into it, she still wouldn"t have a "ship"s brain," the little gadget that served as a lock. "What happened to the Mother Thing?"

"The what?"

"The-" I hesitated. "Uh, the non-human who was in my s.p.a.ce suit with me. You must know, you were there. Is she alive? Is she here?"

But Fats was brooding. "Them bugs don"t interest me none," he said sourly and I could get no more out of him.

But Peewee was alive (and a hard lump in me was suddenly gone). She was here! Her chances, even as a prisoner, had been enormously better on the Moon; nevertheless I felt almost ecstatic to know that she was near. I began thinking about ways to get a message to her.

As for Fats" insinuation that she was playing footy with Wormface, it bothered me not at all. Peewee was unpredictable and sometimes a brat and often exasperating, as well as conceited, supercilious, and downright childish. But she would be burned alive rather than turn traitor. Joan of Arc had not been made of sterner stuff.

We three kept uneasy truce. I avoided them, slept with one eye open, and tried not to sleep unless they were asleep first, and I always kept my dagger at hand. I did not bathe after they joined me; it would have put me at a disadvantage. The older one ignored me, Fats was almost friendly. I pretended not to be afraid of my puny weapon, but I think he was. The reason I think so comes from the first time we were fed. Three cans dropped from the ceiling; Skinny picked up one, Fats got one, but when I circled around to take the third, Fats s.n.a.t.c.hed it.

I said, "Give me that, please."

Fats grinned. "What makes you think this is for you, sonny boy?"

"Uh, three cans, three people."

"So what? I"m feeling a mite hungry. I don"t hardly think I can spare it."

"I"m hungry, too. Be reasonable."

"Mmmm-" He seemed to consider it. "Tell you what. I"ll sell it to you."

I hesitated. It had a shifty logic; Wormface couldn"t walk into Lunar Base commissary and buy these rations; probably Fats or his partner had bought them. I wouldn"t mind signing I.O.U.s-a hundred dollars a meal, a thousand, or a million; money no longer meant anything. Why not humor him?

No! If I gave in, if I admitted I had to d.i.c.ker with him for my prison rations, he would own me. I"d wait on him hand and foot, do anything he told me, just to eat.

I let him see my tin dagger. "I"ll fight you for it."

Fats glanced at my hand and grinned broadly. "Can"t you take a joke?"

He tossed me the can. There was no trouble at feeding times after that, We lived like that "Happy Family" you sometimes see in traveling zoos: a lion caged with a lamb. It is a startling exhibit but the lamb has to be replaced frequently. Fats liked to talk and I learned things from him, when I could sort out truth from lies. His name-so he said-was Jacques de Barre de Vigny ("Call me "Jock." ") and the older man was Timothy Johnson-but I had a hunch that their real names could be learned only by inspecting post office bulletin boards. Despite Jock"s pretense of knowing everything, I soon decided that he knew nothing about Wormface"s origin and little about his plans and purposes. Wormface did not seem the sort to discuss things with "lower animals"; he would simply make use of them, as we use horses.

Jock admitted one thing readily. "Yeah, we put the s.n.a.t.c.h on the brat. There"s no uranium on the Moon; those stories are just to get suckers. We were wasting our time-and a man"s got to eat, don"t he?"

I didn"t make the obvious retort; I wanted information. Tim said, "Shaddap!"

"Aw, what of it, Tim? You worried about the F.B.I.? You think the Man can put the arm on you-here?"

"Shaddap, I said."

"Happens I feel like talking. So blow it." Jock went on, "It was easy. The brat"s got more curiosity than seven cats. He knew she was coming and when." Jock looked thoughtful. "He always knows-he"s got lots of people working for him, some high up. All I had to do was be in Luna City and get acquainted-I made the contact because Tim here ain"t the fatherly type, the way I am. I get to talking with her, I buy her a c.o.ke, I tell her about the romance of hunting uranium on the Moon and similar hogwash. Then I sigh and say it"s too bad I can"t show her the mine of my partner and I. That"s all it took. When the tourist party visited Tombaugh Station, she got away and sneaked out the lock-she worked that part out her ownself. She"s sly, that one. All we had to do was wait where I told her -didn"t even have to be rough with her until she got worried about taking longer for the crawler to get to our mine than I told her." Jock grinned. "She fights pretty well for her weight. Scratched me some."

Poor little Peewee! Too bad she hadn"t drawn and quartered him! But the story sounded true, for it was the way Peewee would behave-sure of herself, afraid of no one, unable to resist any "educational" experience.

Jock went on, "It wasn"t the brat he wanted. He wanted her old man. Had some swindle to get him to the Moon, didn"t work." Jock grinned sourly. "That was a bad time, things ain"t good when he don"t have his own way. But he had to settle for the brat. Tim here pointed out to him he could trade."

Tim chucked in one word which I took as a general denial. Jock raised his eyebrows. "Listen to vinegar puss. Nice manners, ain"t he?"

Maybe I should have kept quiet since I was digging for facts, not philosophy. But I"ve got Peewee"s failing myself; when I don"t understand, I have an unbearable itch to know why. I didn"t (and don"t) understand what made Jock tick. "Jock? Why did you do it?"

"Huh?"

"Look, you"re a human being." (At least he looked like one.) "As you pointed out, we humans had better stick together. How could you bring yourself to kidnap a little girl-and turn her over to him?"

"Are you crazy, boy?"

"I don"t think so."

"You talk crazy. Have you ever tried not doing something he wanted? Try it some time."

I saw his point. Refusing Wormface would be like a rabbit spitting in a snake"s eye-as I knew too well. Jock went on, "You got to understand the other man"s viewpoint. Live and let live, I always say. We got grabbed while we were messin" around, lookin" for carnot.i.te-and after that, we never stood no chance. You can"t fight City Hall, that gets you nowhere. So we made a d.i.c.ker-we run his errands, he pays us in uranium."

My faint sympathy vanished. I wanted to throw up. "And you got paid?"

"Well . . . you might say we got time on the books."

I looked around our cell. "You made a bad deal."

Jock grimaced, looking like a sulky baby. "Maybe so. But be reasonable, kid. You got to cooperate with the inevitable. These boys are moving in-they got what it takes. You seen that yourself. Well, a man"s got to look out for number one, don"t he? It"s a cinch n.o.body else will. Now I seen a case like this when I was no older than you and it taught me a lesson. Our town had run quietly for years, but the Big Fellow was getting old and losing his grip . . . whereupon some boys from St. Louis moved in. Things were confused for a while. A man had to know which way to jump-else he woke up wearing a wooden overcoat, like as not. Those that seen the handwriting made out; those that didn"t . . . well, it don"t do no good to buck the current, I always say. That makes sense, don"t it?"

I could follow his "logic"-provided you accepted his "live louse" standard. But he had left out a key point. "Even so. Jock, I don"t see how you could do that to a little girl."

"Huh? I just explained how we couldn"t help it."

"But you could. Even allowing how hard it is to face up to him and refuse orders, you had a perfect chance to duck out."

"Wha" d"you mean?"

"He sent you to Luna City to find her, you said so. You"ve got a return-fare benefit-I know you have, I know the rules. All you had to do was sit tight, where he couldn"t reach you-and take the next ship back to Earth. You didn"t have to do his dirty work."

"But-"

I cut him off. "Maybe you couldn"t help yourself, out in a lunar desert. Maybe you wouldn"t feel safe even inside Tombaugh Station. But when he sent you into Luna City, you had your chance. You didn"t have to steal a little girl and turn her over to a-a bug-eyed monster!"

He looked baffled, then answered quickly. "Kip, I like you. You"re a good boy. But you ain"t smart. You don"t understand."

"I think I do!"

"No, you don"t." He leaned toward me, started to put a hand on my knee; I drew back. He went on, "There"s something I didn"t tell you . . . for fear you"d think I was a-well, a zombie, or something. They operated on us."

"Huh?"

"They operated on us," he went on glibly. "They planted bombs in our heads. Remote control, like a missile. A man gets out of line . . . he punches a b.u.t.ton-blooie! Brains all over the ceiling." He fumbled at the nape of his neck. "See the scar? My hair"s getting kind o" long . . . but if you look close I"m sure you"ll see it; it can"t "ave disappeared entirely. See it?"

I started to look. I might even have been sold on it-I had been forced to believe less probable things lately. Tim cut short my suspended judgment with one explosive word.

Jock flinched, then braced himself and said, "Don"t pay any attention to him!"

I shrugged and moved away. Jock didn"t talk the rest of that "day." That suited me.

The next "morning" I was roused by Jock"s hand on my shoulder. "Wake up, Kip! Wake up!"

I groped for my toy weapon. "It"s over there by the wall," Jock said, "but it ain"t ever goin" to do you any good now."

I grabbed it. "What do you mean? Where"s Tim?"

"You didn"t wake up?"

"Huh?"

"This is what I"ve been scared of. Cripes, boy! I just had to talk to somebody. You slept through it?"

"Through what? And where"s Tim?"