his voice seemed fat, "And now that's settled, I'm going
to call in some lawyers. While they're around, we conduct ourselves as
though we're three equal partners. On paper, we will be."

"Wait a minute, now," Don blurted. "What do you think you're pulling?
The agreement was we split this whole thing three ways."

Demming's jowls wobbled as he nodded. "That's right. And your share of
the loot is your Galactic Medal of Honor. That and the dubious
privilege of having the whole thing in your name. You'll keep your
medal, and we'll keep our share." He growled heavily, "You don't think
you're getting the short end of the stick, do you?"

Max Rostoff said, "Let's knock this off and get the law boys in. We've
got enough paper work to keep us busy the rest of the week." He sat down
again at his desk and looked up at Don. "Then we'll all be taking off
for Callisto, to get things under way. With any luck, in six months
we'll have every ounce of pitchblende left in the system sewed up."

* * * * *

There was a crowd awaiting his ship at the Callisto Spaceport. A crowd
modest by Earth standards but representing a large percentage of the
small population of Jupiter's moon.

On the way out, a staff of the system's best speech writers, and two top
professional actors had been working with him.

Don Mathers gave a short preliminary talk at the spaceport, and then the
important one, the one that was broadcast throughout the system, that
night from his suite at the hotel. He'd been well rehearsed, and they'd
kept him from the bottle except for two or three quick ones immediately
before going on.

_The project at hand is to extract the newly discovered deposits of
pitchblende on these satellites of Jupiter._

He paused impressively before continuing.

_It's a job that cannot be done in slipshod, haphazard manner. The
system's need for radioactives cannot be overstressed._

_In short, fellow humans, we must allow nothing to stand in the way of
all out, unified effort to do this job quickly and efficiently. My
associates and I have formed a corporation to manage this crash program.
We invite all to participate by purchasing stock. I will not speak of
profits, fellow humans, because in this emergency we all scorn them.
However, as I say, you are invited to participate._

_Some of the preliminary mining concessions are at present in the hands
of individuals or small corporations. It will be necessary