He grew
disturbed. He made a really thorough search. Every sleeping man was
absolutely anonymous. Then--still on the way to harbor--a really
fine-tooth-comb examination of the ship began.

Somebody's radium-dial watch began to glow brightly. The searchers
looked at each other and went pale. They hunted frantically, fear
making them clumsy.

They found it. Rather--they found them.

The stubby tramp had an adequate if rather clumsy atomic bomb in each of
its two holds. The lading of the ship was of materials which--according
to theory--should be detonated in atomic explosion if an atomic bomb
went off nearby. Otherwise they could not be detonated.

The anonymous tramp-steamer had been headed for the harbor of Naples,
whose newspapers--at least those of a certain political party--had been
screaming of the danger of an atomic explosion while American warships
were anchored there.

It was not likely that two atom bombs and a shipload of valuable
secondary atomic explosive had been put on a carefully nameless ship
just to be taken for a ride. If this ship had anchored among the
American fleet and if it had exploded in the Bay of Naples ...

The prophecies of a certain political party would seem to have been
fulfilled. The American ships would be destroyed. Naples itself would be
destroyed. And it would have appeared that Europeans who loved the great
United States had made a mistake.

It was, odd, though, that this ship was the only one that the Invaders'
flying craft had struck with its peculiar weapon.

VI

We humans are rational beings, but we are not often reasonable. Those
who more or less handle us in masses have to take account of that fact.
It could not be admitted that the fleet had had a fight with a ship
piloted by Invaders from another solar system. It would produce a wild
panic, beside which even a war would be relatively harmless. So the
admiral of the Mediterranean fleet composed an order commending his men
warmly for their performance in an unrehearsed firing-drill. Their
target had been--so the order said--a new type of guided missile
recently developed by hush-hush agencies of the Defense Department. The
admiral was pleased and proud, and happy....

It was an excellent order, but it wasn't true. The admiral wasn't happy.
Not after battle photographs were developed and he could see how the
alien ship had dodged rockets with perfect ease, and had actually taken
a five-inch shell, which exploded