leave me here even for a little while—with him."

Brian's arms went around her. "This is the best way, Selo. He'll make trouble. It's not going to be pleasant. Let me get rid of the stones first and then you and I can start out together."

She buried her face in his chest. "I'm so afraid—here alone with him."

Brian tilted her chin up to face him. "There's no reason to be afraid of him. I know his kind. He only talks about things he could do. He won't hurt you. He wouldn't dare."

They were lost in each other's arms as Yancey turned and silently slipped back through the vac-lock. When he noisily re-entered a half hour later his plans were made.

If Brian was surprised by Yancey's sudden change in attitude, he gave no indication. He accepted Yancey's solicitous interest as lightly as he had his surly resentment earlier.

Dinner, the evening before Brian was to set out for Athens, was an hilarious affair on the surface. Yancey insisted on toasting Brian, on exacting a promise that he would come back to visit them. He assured the prospector that they would miss him and that he must consider the humidi-hut his home when he was on Venus.

Brian seemed to accept Yancey's protestations as genuine. Selo regarded her husband with quiet suspicion.

The next morning Yancey made all the preparations for Brian's departure. He had painstakingly drawn a detailed map of the route to Athens. He personally chose a new plasti-shield to protect Brian from the pelting of the dust and sand. Finally he filled the two thermiteens with their precious supply of water.

Finishing up this last chore in the little lab which housed the water supply, he smiled to himself, for he knew that Brian was using his absence from the living-room to pay Selo a fond farewell.

Only as the vac-lock closed on Brian and the indicator showed them he had left the humidi-hut did Yancey relax. He leaned against the door and smiled at Selo.

"So," he half-whispered, "your lover's gone. But he promised you that he'd come back for you, didn't he? Didn't he?"

For a moment Selo met his gaze. Then, she turned and started toward the kitchen.

"I wouldn't leave just yet," he taunted. "I wouldn't 

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