rue to his word, Tawney had given them the freedom of the ship. Greg
and Johnny discovered that their guard was also an excellent guide. All
day he had been leading them through the ship, chatting and answering
their questions about asteroid mining, until they almost forgot that
they were really prisoners here. And the guard's obvious pride in the
scope and skill of his company's mining operations was strangely
infectious.

Watching the Jupiter Equilateral ship in operation, Greg felt his heart
sink. Here was a huge, powerful organization, with all the equipment and
men and know-how they could ever need. How could one man, or two or
three in a team, hope to compete with them? For the independent miner,
the only hope was the Big Strike, the single lode that could make him
rich. He might work all his life without finding it, and then stumble
upon it by sheer chance....

But if he couldn't keep it when he found it, then what? What if the
great mining company became so strong that they could be their own law
in the Belt? What if they grew strong enough and powerful enough to
challenge the United Nations on Mars itself, and gain control of the
entire mining industry? What chance would the independent miner have
then?

It was a frightening picture. Suddenly something began to make sense to
Greg; he realized something about his father that he had never known
before.

Roger Hunter had been a miner, yes. But he had been something else too,
something far more important than just a miner.

Roger Hunter had been a fighter, fighting to the end for something he
believed in....

Tawney interrupted Greg's thought.

"Quite an operation," he said.

Greg looked at him. "So I see."

"And very efficient, too. Our men have everything they need to work
with. We can mine at far less cost than anyone else."

"But you still can't stand the idea of independent miners working the
Belt," Greg said.

Tawney's eyebrows went up. "But why not? There's lots of room out here.
Our operation with Jupiter Equilateral is no different from an
independent miner's operation. We aren't different kinds of people."
Tawney smiled. "When you get right down to it, we're both exactly the
same thing ... scavengers in space, vultures picking over the dead
remains to see what we can find. We come out to the asteroids, and we
bring back what we want and leave the rest behind. And it doesn't matter
whether we've got one ship working or four hundred ... we're