must have seen the spaceboat strung behind and become suspicious."

"You're right, Mister," acknowledged the Commander. "The killers are careful of their skins." He glared at the hateful beauty of the other ship, growing no larger in his screen. "Come on," he challenged.

But the enemy avoided every effort of the earth ship to close in, turning inside. At last, the space fighters were carving a great circle in space, the Earthmen on the outside, traveling a greater distance so that superior speed was largely nullified.

McPartland glared into his screen. Clemens stood by his intra-phone, relaying messages from Parek. Reynolds sat before his calculators, unmoving except for fingers caressing the mike that still waited for his words. McTavish sprawled before his three dimensional model, his grey eyes going over and over every line of it.

At last the Commander spoke the thought in the minds of all four: "We're six Spatial units apart. Maximum range of their ray is five units; ours is four. Coming head on, we pass through the gap between their range and ours in seconds—we almost made it last time! But, if we overhaul them from behind, it might take minutes to close that gap with our speed advantage."

"Right, sir," McTavish agreed, "and minutes would be long enough for them to blast our spaceboat and cable away."

"And then us," finished Clemens. He drew himself up. "I am ready, sir, when you give the order."

Blazing anger faded from the Commander's eyes and face. "Thank you, Mister Clemens. I know you are, and so is every man of our crew. But we're here to save the System, and there's still hope.

"These animals have come a long way," he said jabbing a fist toward the ship in the screen. "They think they can afford to wait us out. But maybe they can't. Mister Clemens, ask Radio to try and contact Earth."

It took long, anxious minutes to make the contact. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Parek held the ship on the same course, with instructions to close at once if the enemy moved toward them.

But the situation remained unchanged, the great circle being traced and retraced through space, ray guns trained, unused. At last, Radio reported contact.

Jon McPartland stepped to the visa-phone. Before him, the faint image of Marshal Denton, supreme 

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