face, to be replaced by an expression of honest perplexity.

"Marta, I—wait, here's the 'copter. I'll tell you about it after we get in. And for the love of heaven, don't drop any pop bottles out of the window the way you did the last time I was in port. Having the air police after us would be the last straw, as far as my nerves are concerned."

He slid into the driver's seat. Marta got two bottles of pop out of the refrigerator, shoved straws into their necks, pulled a shelf out of the paneling to hold one bottle at a convenient level under George's nose, and began drinking out of the other herself.

"Well?" she asked after a couple of swallows.

George drank from his bottle before replying.

"It's the darnedest thing. I remember beginning to load number two and three holds at Aphrodition, and I remember telling the longshore leaderman to have the hatch covers put on again when the holds were filled, but there're six or eight hours in there during the loading I don't remember a single thing about. They're totally gone.

"Well, the way the ship handled at the take-off from Aphrodition, the Old Man thought there must be something wrong, and when we were out in space he went in for a look. Wow! I can see, sort of, why he's sore. Those holds look like somebody'd stirred the things in 'em up with a big stick. About a third of the cargo's ruined. The tongarus have leaked all over those blasted lumigraphs, and—Well, the insurance company is going to raise blue murder, and the owners won't like it one little bit."

George licked his thin lips.

"What I want to know," he burst out, "is what happened to me? I must have told the longshoremen to load the holds like that, but—When we were two days out of Venus, I asked Sparks (he's had a pre-medical course, and he's saving up the tuition for medical school) to look me over. He gave me all the tests, dozens of them, and finally told me there wasn't a thing wrong with me mentally or physically except that I needed more rest. Rest, bushwah! I've been sleeping ten hours a night, and I wake up tireder than when I went to bed."

Marta studied him.

"You do look sort of tired," she observed. "Maybe you need some vitor-ray treatments."

George ignored this comment.

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