colonial peasant women are of the same mold." He sneered.

Whack.

His face stung and his eyes smarted from the strength of her slap. Her eyes blazed at him furiously.

"Faradson is depending on this Uranium. It will get to him regardless of the means." She produced the ancient automatic pistol. "If there is no other way, I shall force you to do my bidding with this!"

Pell looked at her contemptuously, turned, and groped back to the control room. When he shrugged into his shock suit, she entered similarly clad. She still held the weapon and her eyes were icy. Her mouth twitched out of control. She seated herself in the shock chair beside him, saying nothing.

Pell switched his gaze from the dials before him to her face. With a leisurely motion he reached out, took her pistol, and thrust it into his pocket.

"I'm getting tired of that thing, baby," he said.

He turned his attention back to the maze of instruments spread before him on the control board and spoke to the girl again without looking up.

"You want speed? Well, baby, you'll get it, regardless of our fat friend back there!"

He jerked his thumb back at the waist. The craft leaped forward, slamming him back into the shock chair. The indicators trembled in their pads and the acceleration needle registered 23 G's.

Pell's head throbbed in rhythm to the shriek of the overworked converter. He goaded his tired eyes to pierce the pain haze that filmed them. The acceleration was more than 600 miles per second. His bones had lead for marrow; each of his joints was a separate discord in a cacophony of pains that tortured him. Bending his will with a great effort, he cut the converter to one G.

Instantly the body-smashing weight lifted from him. For several moments he did not try to move. His heart raced madly as the pressure was removed from it. Pell breathed deeply and looked at the girl. She was slumped forward in the shock chair but even as he looked at her, she began to stir. In spite of himself, Pell felt a twinge of respect for her.

He busied himself with the Thelmard Distorter Field. This would enable the craft to drop into extra-dimensional space, so to speak, by wrapping or folding space about itself. Working rapidly, Pell shot an orbit in 

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