button, the other held the motor release.

When he jumped clear, the car spurted. With lights off in the darkness
the automatic brake wouldn't work. A hundred yards down the car slowed,
swerved, hit a concrete abutment. Quite a crash, Case thought. That
ought to turn a few heads the wrong way for a while.

He was at the high fence in a flash. His fingers searched for and found
crevices. Those fingers were strong as steel. They hauled Case Damon
upward and over the top. He grinned into the darkness.

Men were running from the hangars toward the site of the crash. With no
incoming traffic slated, the control tower had swung all lights that
way. Somewhere a crash siren sang its song.

Case dropped completely relaxed. His feet hit first as he fell forward.
His hands hit next, then his head was down between his shoulders and he
was rolling forward onto the back of his neck and then onto his feet
again. He came up running.

* * * * *

It was going to be a slow start without rocket-boosters. But rockets
made light and sound. This had to be a silent takeoff.

He knew his way around this tiny ship even in complete blackness. He had
designed it himself, and it was completely functional. Case Damon had
wanted no comforts; those came at the end of a journey. When there was a
race for a newly discovered ore field, it was the man who got there
first, not most comfortably, who won out.

A sharp click told Case that the anti-grav was on. He was looking
through his forward visalloy plate straight up into a starlit sky. That
wasn't too good. Small as the ship was, it still would make a dark blot.

His eyes roved, discovered a few wisps of cloud. He prayed them closer.
Now!

This wasn't the first time he'd taken off in darkness, depending on
spring power to lift him silently out of the hangar cradle. He'd beaten
them all to Trehos only because they'd figured to catch his takeoff by
the rocket flashes. They'd figured to tail him that way, too, only by
the time the competition had found out he was gone, he'd been half way
there.

Cranly hadn't called him in on this without good reason. Together, he
and Cranly had made many a rocket jaunt to distant and dangerous places.
They'd been a good team before Cranly had sought election to the
Council. Cranly was the cautious kind; but when he knew exactly where he
stood, he could move fast enough.

Case slid the ship behind a cloud and felt his speed sla