ed questions, and
Sally said: "I know. I'll take him there. I know my way around."

Her father's expression did not change. He simply included Sally in his
orders on the phone.

He hung up and said briefly: "The plane will be surveyed and taken apart
as soon as possible. By the time you find your man you can probably
examine the crates. I'll have you cleared for it."

His secretary reached in a drawer for order forms to fill out and hand
him to sign. Sally tugged at Joe's arm. They left.

Outside, she said: "There's no use arguing with my father, Joe. He has a
terrible job, and it's on his mind all the time. He hates being a
Security officer, too. It's a thankless job--and no Security officer
ever gets to be more than a major. His ability never shows. What he does
is never noticed unless it fails. So he's frustrated. He's got poor Miss
Ross--his secretary, you know--so she just listens to what he says must
be done and she writes it out. Sometimes he goes days without speaking
to her directly. But really it's pretty bad! It's like a war with no
enemy to fight except spies! And the things they do! They've been known
even to booby-trap a truck after an accident, so anybody who tries to
help will be blown up! So everything has to be done in a certain way or
everything will be ruined!"

She led him to an office with a door that opened directly into the Shed.
In spite of his bitterness, Joe was morosely impatient to see inside.
But Sally had to identify him formally as the Joe Kenmore who was the
subject of her father's order, and his fingerprints had to be taken, and
somebody had him stand for a moment before an X-ray screen. Then she led
him through the door, and he was in the Shed where the Space Platform
was under construction.

It was a vast cavern of metal sheathing and spidery girders, filled with
sound and detail. It took him seconds to begin to absorb what he saw and
heard. The Shed was five hundred feet high in the middle, and it was all
clear space without a single column or interruption. There were arc
lamps burning about its edges, and high up somewhere there were strips
of glass which let in a pale light. All of it resounded with many noises
and clanging echoes of them.

There were rivet guns at work, and there were the grumblings of motor
trucks moving about, and the oddly harsh roar of welding torches. But
the torch flames looked only like marsh fires, blue-white and eerie
against the mass of the thing