he'd rather not try to get back up to the control room right now."

"Tell him to come to the mike anyhow. I don't want to talk to you till I talk to Stein."

"Stein can't talk, I tell you. If you don't want to talk to me, then are you ready to come in?"

"And get shot?" retorted Jonner.

So Jonner's suspicions were that definite. It was to be expected after the words Stein had been able to shout into the microphone. Jonner was nobody's dumbbell.

Kraag tired once more.

"That's a ridiculous idea, Jonner," he said. "I can't figure why you'd say such a thing."

"You shot Stein," said Jonner positively. "There's no use your denying it. I know you shot Stein, and I'll know it until Stein himself tells me it isn't so."

Kraag knew Jonner too well to try to keep up the pretense any longer. He tried another tack.

"Okay, so I shot Stein," he admitted. "That doesn't mean I'll shoot you. Come on in and talk it over. We can make a deal."

"If you shot Stein, why wouldn't you shoot me?" asked Jonner logically.

"There wasn't enough air for three. There is for two."

Jonner was silent for a moment.

"So that's why you did it," he said then. "Figured it pretty close, didn't you, Kraag?"

"I'm the guy who has to watch supplies on this boat. I checked the oxygen after the crash broke open those three compartments on the supply deck. There's 3800 pounds of oxygen left. It'll take about 22 months for the rescue ship to get here from Mars. At 2.8 pounds of oxygen a day, you and I can make it, but it would have lasted the three of us only 15 months."

Jonner cursed him for a full minute, not loudly but with such intensity that Kraag felt his face getting warm.

"You damn murderer!" finished Jonner. "You damn cold-blooded murderer!"

"Cut it out, Jonner," growled Kraag. "I can't understand you and Stein. What were you expecting to save us? A miracle?"

"I don't feel like talking about it now," said Jonner warily. "If you had only ... Hell, Kraag, we'd 

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