history. And in
searching for Wallace and Simms, we'll have to be twice as smart as they
are!"

"Yes, sir," said Tom. "First we have to figure out what they will do,
and then figure out how we're going to beat them!"

"That's right, Tom," nodded Strong. "And by the stars, if we don't beat
them, the only safe place left for the credits and securities of the
people in the system will be behind rows of paralo-ray guns!"

CHAPTER 7

"Attention! Attention! This is Captain Maitland of the rocket cruiser
_Orion_ reporting to Captain Strong at Space Academy. Come in, Strong!"

High in the Tower of Galileo overlooking Space Academy, the Solar Guard
officer, his face showing the strain of the last three-weeks' futile
search for Wallace and Simms, flipped on the teleceiver and replied,
"Strong here. Go ahead, Maitland."

Tom, Astro, Roger, and Commander Walters stood behind Strong and waited
tensely for the last report to come in. Mainland's voice crackled
through millions of miles of space.

"We've searched space quadrants A through D, sections twenty-one through
one hundred thirty-eight. Constant six-way radar sweep of the area. No
sign of Wallace and Simms."

Strong sighed deeply and replied, "All right, Maitland. Thank you. You
may return to base. End transmission."

"End transmission!" signaled Maitland, and the crackling static died out
in the quiet room.

Walters stepped forward and placed his hand on Strong's shoulder. "Don't
let it get you down, Steve," he said. "I saw the zone search you set up
for those two. No one could have done more."

"Maybe not, sir," said Strong, getting up, "but we didn't catch them."

"Not yet," frowned the commander grimly, "but we will! Well, there's
nothing else to do here. That was the last patrol ship to report, so you
might as well close up shop."

He turned to the cadets, who had been reassigned from the exposition as
aides to Captain Strong in his search for Wallace and Simms. "You three
come with us," said Walters. "I've got an idea and I want all of you to
hear it."

Strong and the boys followed the commander out of the Academy
communications center down to his luxuriously furnished office.

"Perhaps," said Walters, settling back in his chair and lighting an
enormous pipe filled with red Venusian tobacco, "perhaps we have been
hunting the fox with the wrong kind of dogs."

"Assuming that Wallace and Simms are the foxes in this case and the
Solar Guard the h