Of course, the SS detachment on Terra had such equipment—and plenty of it. But the equipment was under the control of an SS officer and couldn’t be checked out without his permission. A certain Citizen Major Gironde, as it happened.

“Dollars to donuts,” Kevin mused, “the girl escaped. I can’t think of anything else right now that would stir up Manpower’s headquarters. Not in the middle of the night, anyway.”

Victor was confused again. “What are ‘dollars’? And ‘donuts’?”

“Never mind, lad,” replied Kevin, shaking his head. “Are you ready?”

Classical allusions might have been above Victor’s head, but the last question wasn’t. Instantly, his face was set in stone, hard and firm as unyielding granite.

By now, Ginny was lying half-erect on her elbow, her cheek nestled in the palm of her hand. She gazed up at Victor’s face admiringly. “Anybody ever mention you’d make a great poster boy for an SS recruitment drive?”

Ginny’s repartee usually left Victor confused and embarrassed. But not this time.

Hard; firm—unyielding as granite.

Durkheim

Durkheim was awakened by the insistent ring of the communicator. Silently, he cursed the Mesan idiots who were careless enough to call him at his own residence. Granted, the communicator was a special one, carefully scrambled. Still—

He only spent a few seconds on that curse, however. Soon enough, he had other things to curse the Mesans for—and not silently.

What did you expect—you morons!—using Scrags? I can’t believe anyone would be stupid enough to think—

But he didn’t indulge himself for very long in that pointless exercise. For one thing, the Mesan on the other end was indifferent to his outrage. For another, Durkheim himself had always understood that his plan was too intricate to be sure of success. So, from the very beginning, he had designed a fallback.

After breaking off his contact with the Mesan, Durkheim spent an hour or so staring at the ceiling of his bedroom. He didn’t bother to turn on a light. He found the darkness helpful in concentrating his attention, as he carefully went over every step of his next maneuver.

Then, satisfied that it would work, he even managed to get some sleep. Not much, unfortunately. The problem wasn’t that Durkheim couldn’t get to sleep—he’d never had any trouble doing that—but simply that he had to reset the alarm to a much earlier hour. He would have to be at work by the crack of dawn, in order to have everything in place.

Helen

It didn’t take Helen long to find the lair of her three would-be assailants, even moving as carefully as she was. The place was less than a hundred yards distant, just around the bend in the channel.

She spent five minutes studying it, before she crept forward. The “lair” was just that—a habitation fit more for animals than men. The lean-to propped against the sloping wall of the channel reminded her of a bird’s nest. Made by a very large and very careless bird. The shack—even that term was too grandiose—had been assembled from various pieces of wreckage and debris, lashed together with an assortment of wire and cordage. At its highest, it was not tall enough for even a short adult to stand up. From one end to the other, it measured not more than fifteen feet. There was no opening at her end, so Helen supposed that whatever entrance existed was on the opposite side.

She hesitated, but not for long. Her water was getting low and so, soon enough, would her food. There might well be something in that lean-to, however unpalatable. Besides, she had no choice but to go past it—unless she wanted to retrace her steps back toward her captors—and so she might as well investigate it along the way.

The decision made, she moved quickly, racing toward the lean-to on quick and almost silent feet. If there were more men lurking within, she saw no reason to give them any more warning than necessary. One or two, she was certain she could handle. More than that, she could outrun them.

But there were no men in the lair to pose any danger to her. Instead there was something infinitely more dangerous—a moral dilemma.

The boy, she thought, was probably not more than twelve years old. Hard to tell, due to his bruises and emaciation under the rags. The girl was perhaps Helen’s own age. But that was even harder to determine, despite the fact that she wore no clothing at all. The girl didn’t have bruises so much as she seemed a single giant bruise.

Helen removed the filthy blanket and gave the girl a quick examination. The examination, for all its brevity, was both thorough and fairly expert. Her father had also seen to it that Helen received first aid instruction.

When she was done, and despite her recognition that an immense complication had just entered her life, Helen felt relieved. Immensely relieved, in truth. Less than half an hour earlier, for the first time in her life, she had killed people. Despite her concentration on her own predicament, some part of Helen’s soul had been shrieking ever since. Now, it was silent. Silent and calm. If ever men had deserved killing, those men had.

Since she entered the lean-to, the boy had huddled silently against one side, staring at her with eyes as wide as saucers. Finally, he spoke.

“You won’t hurt my sister, will you?” he whispered. His pale eyes moved to the battered figure lying on the pallet. The girl, for her part, was conscious. But she was just staring at Helen through slitted eyes, as if she were blinded by the light. “I don’t think Berry can take much more hurting.”

He started to cry. “I don’t know how long we’ve been here. It seems like forever since they caught us. We were just looking for food. We weren’t going to steal any from them, honest. I tried to tell them.”

Helen heard the girl whisper something. She leaned over.

“Go away,” were the words. “They’ll come back soon.”

Helen shook her head. “They’re dead. I killed them.”

The girl’s eyes popped open. “That’s a lie,” she whispered. “Why are you lying?”

Helen looked at the boy. “What’s your name?”

“Larens. People call me Lars.”

Helen jerked her head. “Go down the channel, Lars.” She pointed the direction. “That way. Just around the bend.”

He didn’t hesitate for more than a few seconds. Then, scurrying like a mouse, he scrambled out of the lean-to. While she waited for him to return, Helen did what she could to help Berry. Which wasn’t much, beyond digging out some food and wiping off the grime with the cleanest rag she could find. Fortunately, while Helen didn’t find much food there were enough water bottles that she was able to use some of it to wet the rag.

Throughout, other than an occasional hiss when Helen rubbed over a particularly sore spot, Berry kept silent. The girl was obviously weak, but Helen’s principal fear—that the girl’s wits were gone—soon proved false. As best as she could, given her condition, Berry tried to help by moving her limbs and torso to accept the rag.

Still, it was obvious that the girl was in no condition to walk. Helen wondered what was taking Lars so long to return. But while she waited she started assembling the makings of a stretcher. Or, at least, a travois—she wasn’t sure Lars would be strong enough to hold up his end of the thing.

“What are you doing?” whispered Berry, watching Helen dismantle part of the lean-to. Helen had found two rods which she thought would make a suitable frame. She had no idea what they had been originally, nor even what they were made of. Some kind of artificial substance she didn’t recognize. But, for all that they were a bit more flexible than she would have liked, they were about the right length and, she thought—hoped—strong enough.