. Daylight had come to show plainly the
silver hull with the distinctive red markings of the Service that
slipped smoothly down from above to hang poised under flashing fans like
a giant humming-bird. Her directed radio beam flashed the yellow call
signal in O'Malley's control room.

* * * * *

Chet was beside him, and the two exchanged silent glances before
O'Malley cut in his transmitter. He must give name and number--this
signal was a demand that could not be disregarded--but on the old
freighter was no automatic sender that would flash the information
across to the other ship; the pilot's voice must serve instead.

"Number three--seven--G--four--two!" he thundered into the radiophone.
"Freighter of the Intercolonial Line, without cargo--"

"For the love of Pete," shouted the loudspeaker beside him in volume to
drown out the pilot's words, "are you sending this by short wave, or are
you just yelling across to me? Calm down, you Irish terrier!"

Then, before the pilot could reply, the voice from the silver and red
patrol ship dropped into an exaggerated mimicry of the O'Malley brogue--

"And did yez say 'twas a freighter you had there? Sure, I thot at th'
very last 'twas a foine big liner from the Orient and Transpolar run,
dropped down here from the hoigh livils! All right, Spud; on your way!
But don't crowd the bottom of the Twelve Level so close. This is
O--sixteen--L; Jimmy Maddux. By--by! I'll report you O.K."

* * * * *

Again Chet looked at the pilot silently before he glanced back at the
vanishing ship, already small in the distance. He repeated the Patrol
Captain's words:

"You will 'report us O.K.'--yes, Jimmy, you'll do that, and if they want
to find us again you can tell them right where to look."

"I'm pushin' her all I can, Mr. Bullard," said Spud. "'Tis all she can
do.... And now do ye go into my cabin--there's two berths there--and
we'll just turn in and sleep while my relief man takes his turn. But go
in before I call him; there's not a soul on the ship besides ourselves
knows that you're here."

And, in the cabin a short time later, Pilot O'Malley chuckled as he
whispered: "I gave the lad his course. And Mac will follow it, but it'll
niver take him near to the part of Rooshia he expects it to. Still, the
record's clear as far as he's concerned; I've got it in the log. Mac's a
good lad, and I wouldn't have him get into trouble o