ril,
despairing and bewildered as she was, caught sight of something vastly
larger than the Med Ship, floating in space. She stared. The Med Ship
maneuvered very cautiously. She saw another large object. A third. A
fourth. There seemed to be dozens of them.

They were space-ships, huge by comparison with Aesclipus Twenty. They
floated as the Med Ship did. They did not drive. They were not in
formation. They were not at even distances from each other. They did not
point in the same direction. They swung in emptiness like derelicts.

Calhoun jockeyed his small ship with infinite care. Presently there came
the gentlest of impacts and then a clanking sound. The appearance out
the vision-port became stationary, but still unbelievable. The Med Ship
was grappled magnetically to a vast surface of welded metal.

Calhoun relaxed. He opened a wall-panel and brought out a vacuum suit.
He began briskly to get it on.

"Things move smoothly," he commented. "We weren't challenged. So it's
extremely unlikely that we were spotted. Our friends on the floor ought
to begin to come to shortly. And I'm going to find out now whether I'm a
hero or in sure-enough trouble!"

Maril said drearily;

"I don't know what you've done, except--"

Calhoun blinked at her, in the act of hauling the vacuum suit over his
shoulders.

"Isn't it self-evident?" he demanded. "I've been giving astrogation
lessons to these characters. I certainly didn't do it to help them dump
germ-cultures on Weald! I brought them here! Don't you see the point?
These are space-ships. They're in orbit around Weald. They're not manned
and they're not controlled. In fact, they're nothing but sky-riding
storage bins!"

He seemed to consider the explanation complete. He wriggled his arms
into the sleeves and gloves of the suit. He slung the air-tanks over his
shoulder and hooked them to the suit.

"I'll be back," he said. "I hope with good news. I've reason to be
hopeful, though, because these Wealdians are very practical men. They
have things all prepared and tidy. I suspect I'll find these ships with
stores of air and fuel--maybe even food--so that if Weald should manage
to make a deal for the stuff stored out here in them, they'd only have
to bring out crews."

* * * * *

He lifted the space-helmet down from its rack and put it on. He tested
it, reading the tank air-pressure, power-storage, and other data from
the lighted miniature instr