were more men and vehicles on the job
than room for them to work. I passed over the heads of the crowd
around the edges and got onto a comparatively unobstructed side where
I could watch and get views of the fire fighters pulling down the big
skins of wax and loading them onto contragravity skids to be hauled
away. It still wasn't too hot to work unshielded, and they weren't
anywhere near the burning stacks, but the fire seemed to be spreading
rapidly. The dredger and the three shielded derricks hadn't gotten
into action yet.

I circled around clockwise, dodging over, under and around the skids
and lorries hauling wax out of danger. They were taking them into the
section through which I had brought the jeep a few minutes before, and
just dumping them on top of the piles of mineral nutrients.

The operation seemed to be directed from an improvised headquarters in
the area that had been cleared of ammunition. There were a couple of
view screens and a radio, operated by women. I saw one of the teachers
I'd gone to school to a few years ago, and Joe Kivelson's wife, and
Oscar Fujisawa's current girl friend, and Sigurd Ngozori's secretary,
and farther off there was an equally improvised coffee-and-sandwich
stand. I grounded the jeep, and Murell and I got out and went over to
the headquarters. Joe Kivelson seemed to be in charge.

I have, I believe, indicated here and there that Joe isn't one of our
mightier intellects. There are a lot of better heads, but Joe can be
relied upon to keep his, no matter what is happening or how bad it
gets. He was sitting on an empty box, his arm in a now-filthy sling,
and one of Mohandas Feinberg's crooked black cigars in his mouth.
Usually, Joe smokes a pipe, but a cigar's less bother for a
temporarily one-armed man. Standing in front of him, like a schoolboy
in front of the teacher, was Mayor Morton Hallstock.

"But, Joe, they simply won't!" His Honor was wailing. "I did talk to
Mr. Fieschi; he says he knows this is an emergency, but there's a
strict company directive against using the spaceport area for storage
of anything but cargo that has either just come in or is being shipped
out on the next ship."

"What's this all about?" Murell asked.

"Fieschi, at the spaceport, won't let us store this wax in the
spaceport area," Joe said. "We got to get it stored somewhere; we need
a lot of floor space to spread this fire out on, once we get into it.
We have to knock the burning wax cylind