fecraft were in their slots, but the five
and the four still lived in them rather than in the vast and oppressive
emptiness that the ship itself now was. And socially, outside of working
hours, the two groups did not mix.

Clean-up was going nicely, at the union rate of six hours on and
eighteen hours off. Deston could have set any hours he pleased, but he
didn't. There was plenty of time. Eleven months in deep space is a
fearfully, a tremendously long time.

"Morning," "afternoon," "evening," and "night" were, of course, purely
conventional terms. The twenty-four-hour "day" measured off by the
brute-force machine that was their masterclock carried no guarantee,
expressed or implied, as to either accuracy or uniformity.

One evening, then, four hard-faced men sat at two small tables in the
main room of Lifecraft Three. Two of them, Ferdy Blaine and Moose
Mordan, were playing cards for small stakes. Ferdy was of medium size;
compact rather than slender; built of rawhide and spring steel. Lithe
and poised, he was the epitome of leashed and controlled action. Moose
was six-feet-four and weighed a good two-forty--stolid, massive, solid.
Ferdy and Moose; a tiger and an elephant; both owned _in fee simple_ by
Vincent Lopresto.

The two at the other table had been planning for days. They had had many
vitriolic arguments, but neither had made any motion toward his weapon.

"Play it my way and we've got it made, I tell you!" Newman pounded the
table with his fist. "Seventy _million_ if it's a cent! Heavier grease
than your lousy spig Syndicate ever even _heard_ of! I'm as good an
astrogator as Jones is, and a damn sight better engineer. In electronics
I maybe ain't got the theory Pretty Boy has, but at building and
repairing the stuff I've forgot more than he ever will know. At
_practical_ stuff, and that's all we give a whoop about, I lay over
both them sissies like a Lunar dome."

"Oh, yeah?" Lopresto sneered. "How come you aren't ticketed for
subspace, then?"

"For hell's sake, act your age!" Newman snorted in disgust. Eyes locked
and held, but nothing happened. "D'ya think I'm dumb? Or that them
subspace Boy Scouts can be fixed? Or I don't know where the heavy grease
is at? Or I can't make the approach? Why ain't _you_ in subspace?"

"I see." Lopresto forced his anger down. "But I've got to be _sure_ we
can get back without 'em."

"You can be _damn_ sure. I got to get back myself, don't I? But get one
thing down s