second view was
of a passenger liner with the elaborate ornamentation that in past
generations was considered suitable for space. There was a bulk-cargo
ship, with no emergency rockets at all and crews' quarters in long
blisters built outside the gigantic tank which was the ship itself.
There was a needle-sharp space yacht. More freighters, with streaks of
rust on their sides where they had lain aground for tens of years....

The fleet was an anomaly, and each of its component parts was separately
a freak. It was a gathering-together of all the outmoded and obsolete
hulks and monstrosities of space. One would have to scavenge half the
galaxy to bring together so many crazy, over-age derelicts that should
have been in junk yards.

Then Hoddan drew an explosive deep breath. It was suddenly clear what
the fleet was and what its reason must be. Why it stopped here could not
yet be guessed, but--

Hoddan watched absorbedly. He couldn't know what was toward, but there
was some emergency. It could be in the line of what an electronic
engineer could handle. If so--why--it could mean an opportunity to
accomplish great things, and grow rich, and probably marry some
delightful girl and be a great man somewhere--an assortment of ambitions
one could not easily gratify on Zan, or Walden, or Darth.

VII

The spaceboat floated on upon a collision-course with the arriving
fleet. That would not mean, of course, actual contact with any of the
improbable vessels themselves. Crowded as the sunlit specks might seem
from Darth's night-side shadow, they were sufficiently separated. It was
more than likely that even with ten-mile intervals the ships would be
considered much too crowded. But they came pouring out of emptiness to
go into a swirling, plainly pre-intended orbit about the planet from
which Hoddan had risen less than an hour before.

There was inevitable confusion, though, and the spacephone proved it.
There were disputes between freakish ships when craft with the
astrogational qualities of washtubs tried to keep assigned positions,
and failed, and there were squabbles when ships had to pass close
together. One had to shut off its drive-field to keep from blowing the
fuses of both.

But there were some ships which proceeded quietly to their positions and
others which did the same after tumult amounting to rebellion. And
naturally there were a few others which seemed incapable of co-operation
with anybody. They went