id. Blades jerked his
undisciplined imagination back from the idea of a Thing, with bug eyes
and tentacles, cast in reinforced concrete, and listened as his
partner summed up:

"The popular feeling at home has turned against private enterprise.
You can hardly call a corporate monster like Systemic Developments a
private enterprise! The new President and Congress share that mood. We
can expect to see it manifested in changed laws and regulations. But
what has this got to do with a battleship parked a couple of hundred
kilometers from us?"

"If the government doesn't want the asterites to develop much
further--" Blades bit hard on his pipestem. "They must know we have a
caviar mine here. We'll be the only city in this entire sector."

"But we're still a baby," Avis said. "We won't be important for years
to come. Who'd have it in for a baby?"

"Besides, we're Americans, too," Chung said. "If that were a foreign
ship, the story might be different--Wait a minute! Could they be
thinking of establishing a new base here?"

"The Convention wouldn't allow," said Blades.

"Treaties can always be renegotiated, or even denounced. But first you
have to investigate quietly, find out if it's worth your while."

"Hoo hah, what lovely money that'd mean!"

"And lovely bureaucrats crawling out of every file cabinet," Chung
said grimly. "No, thank you. We'll fight any such attempt to the last
lawyer. We've got a good basis, too, in our charter. If the suit is
tried on Ceres, as I believe it has to be, we'll get a sympathetic
court as well."

"Unless they ring in an Earthside judge," Avis warned.

"Yeah, that's possible. Also, they could spring proceedings on us
without notice. We've got to find out in advance, so we can prepare.
Any chance of pumping some of those officers?"

"'Fraid not," Avis said. "The few who'd be in the know are safely back
on shipboard."

"We could invite 'em here individually," said Blades. "As a matter of
fact, I already have a date with Lieutenant Ziska."

"What?" Avis' mouth fell open.

"Yep," Blades said complacently. "End of the next watch, so she can
observe the _Pallas_ arriving. I'm to fetch her on a scooter." He blew
a fat smoke ring. "Look, Jimmy, can you keep everybody off the porch
for a while then? Starlight, privacy, soft music on the piccolo--who
knows what I might find out?"

"You won't get anything from _her_," Avis spat. "No secrets or, or
anything."

"Still, I look forward to