another to win small advantages—chiefly in the matter of valuation of the various items of trade goods he had to offer. None of the lone traders ever dealt in cash. The Swapper was most appropriately named.

At last they shook on the bargain—and a bargain it most obviously was from the trader's point of view. Mr. Raoul Dement, or so the company man styled himself, presented the visiting captain two flasks of the violet liquor after the old custom of the trade.

"Nice stuff," observed Hank Karns, licking his lip. "The best I ever."

"There's twelve cases of it in the warehouse," said Dement, with a wink. "Now, if you were the smuggling sort, there would be a nice profit for you. But, of course...."

"Hell," exploded Hank Karns, "running comet-dew's no sin. Wisht I had a decimo for every gallon I've hauled. Once in a coon's age I get stuck with a little fine, but shucks—the customer'll allus pay that for you."

There followed more dickering, but the upshot of it was that Hank Karns signed up for everything that had been offered him.

"Bon voyage," said Mr. Dement. "If you ever pass this way again, drop in and visit."

"Sure will," said Hank Karns, looking his man in the eye. He was interested in his host's forehead. About an inch from the right temple there was a slight depression—the ineradicable scar of an old skull injury.

Mercury was still a big disk behind when the Swapper straightened out on her earthward trajectory.

"Step alive there, Billy, we got lots to do."

All the blandness, all the gullibility and child-like faith were gone from Hank Karns' face now. He looked much more like work-ridden gnome than an emaciated Santa Claus. For they had unpacked every case and strewn its contents on the deck, looking for contraband of a more serious nature than the harmless comet-dew. But no case contained anything except what the invoice declared. Hank left the job of repacking to the boy and went about a minute search of the ship itself.

In that he was not a moment too soon. Behind the control board—hidden under the vine-like mass of electric leads—were two thermobombs. Their detonating coils were already hot. The control board was divided into three panels, each controlling an opposite pair of the six tubes which were arranged hexagonally 

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