l, you big lug!" she said. "The handsomest
picture I've ever seen in any paper."

"Nah!" denied Schwenky. "It is not the handsomest. All of us have our
pictures in the paper. We are all very good looking! Not only Schwenky.
Is it not so, Gene, my friend?"

Gene grinned at him, and at the others. Maher pounded him on the back,
and over the uproar came the voice of the editor of the _Sentinel_.
"Telephone for Mr. Schwenky!"

Schwenky looked dazed, cocked his big ears at the editor. "For
Schwenky?" he asked stupidly. "Telephone? Who would call Schwenky on the
telephone?"

"How do I know?" said the editor. "It's some lady...." He thrust the
phone into the big Swede's hand.

"Lady?" said Schwenky wonderingly. "Hello ... lady ..." he spoke into
the receiver, his booming voice making it rattle.

"The other ..." began Gene, then desisted. "Never mind, she'll hear
you...."

"What? You want to marry me? Lady...." Schwenky's eyes bulged even more,
and he roared into the transmitter. "Lady! You wait! I come!" He thrust
the phone into the editor's hands and made for the door like a lumbering
bull.

"Where you going?" yelled Gene.

Schwenky halted, turned with a big grin, "I go to marry lady. She asked
me to become my wife!"

"Where is she?" asked Gene. "Where are you going to meet her?"

Schwenky looked stupidly at the now silent phone. "By golly! I forget to
ask her!" There was tragedy in his voice. "Now I never find her!"

The editor laughed. "Never mind--you'll get a hundred more proposals
before the day's over. You can take your pick!"

Schwenky's eyes opened wide. Then he grinned again. "Yah!" he roared. "I
take my pick! She will be so beautiful! Yah!"

The chatter of the teletype interrupted him, and the editor turned to
watch the tape as it came from the machine. Then he began to read:

"Washington. April 23. President Walworth has grounded all spaceships
and ordered all those enroute to proceed to the nearest port. A
Congressional committee has been picked, including top members of the
cabinet, to investigate the ships, the atomic drives, and the system of
secret slavery among crews. In a statement to the Press, President
Walworth said that space travel will not be resumed until proper shields
are developed. But he added that he had been informed by leading
physicists that the problem can be solved within a year if sufficient
funds were available. Said the President: 'I will see that the funds are
made av