faced here? Where would they get such men to renounce the brilliant careers they could have amongst civilization with such capabilities?"

"Damn it! Stop playing games. Spill what you've got to say!"

Aron looked at him coldly, searchingly, "Since you are attached to the Navy I imagine you've clocked many hours in space." When the agent nodded, Aron said, "Then, if you are lucky and show enough sense, you will become a TA man."

Slowly, comprehension came to the Intelligence man. The gun clutched in his hand lowered, his whole body slumped as he caught on to the fact they had overlooked. The fact that caused the failure of their plans. The fact that was his grim future.

"Fermi radiations!" Aron barked. "They rot your cells, weaken the blood, ruin the body. A man can spend about five years as a spaceman, about twenty months of which is spent in actual space. Twenty months and the man is doomed.

"If the man is smart he can become a space officer, then when he retires at twenty-five, he can land a good job with the TA. He doesn't want anything to do with civilization. That five years has made him love space, love isolation. So, they are willing to take these jobs, to be put out to pasture on wayward planets until they die at thirty-five." It was said with all the bitterness of a condemned man.

"What use would I have of your offers, even if they were true. When I finish, or rather, if I had finished my stay on Kligor, I'd only have a few months till I die. Your pleasant little cries of adventure, luxury, women, meant nothing.[Pg 30]

[Pg 30]

"I just wanted to be alone to die."

Now it was the enemy agent's turn to speak bitterly. "Then you planned it all along. You led our men on, pretending you were going to aid us while you were in our midst learning everything about us to destroy us.

"You finally found the method, God knows where you dug up that fiendish idea of sulphuric gas, but you planned and watched. I'll never know how you were so lucky—and it was pure luck, but you did it. You destroyed our base."

With a smile, "Yes, I was lucky, I had a chance to end my life in a final battle and victory. That's all a man can ask for."

Aron was still smiling when the blast of the Intelligence man's gun 

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