speed, necessary for taking off and landing, but terribly wasteful of fuel.

Overdrive had been the triumph of space-navigation for thousands of years. It was like the second gear of the ancient land-cars. And the transmitter-drive of Kim's devising was high speed, almost infinite speed—but it could not be used within a solar system. It was too fast.

Kim drove to the farther orbit of Khiv Five and then went into a long, slow, free fall toward the banded planet below. In the old days it would have been changed to a landing-parabola at an appropriate moment.

"Now," said Kim grimly, "my guess is that we haven't enough fuel to make anything but a crash-landing. Which would mean that we should all get killed. So we will hope very earnestly that a warship is still hanging about Khiv Five, and that it comes and tries to wipe us out."

Dona pointed to a tiny dial. Its needle quivered ever so slightly from its point of rest.

"Mmmmm," said Kim. "Right at the limit of the detector's range. Something using power. We should know how a worm on a fish-hook feels, right now. We're bait."

He waited—and waited—and waited.

The small hundred-foot hull of the space-ship seemed motionless, seen from without. The stars were infinitely far away. The great ringed sun was a hundred and twenty million miles distant. Even the belted planet Khiv Five was a good half-million miles below.

Such motion as the Starshine possessed was imperceptible. It floated with a vast leisureliness in what would be a parabolic semi-orbit. But it would take days to make sure. And meanwhile....

Meanwhile the Starshine seemed to spawn. A small object appeared astern. Suddenly it writhed convulsively. Light glinted upon it. It whirled dizzily, then more dizzily still, and abruptly it was a shape. It was, in fact, the shape of a space-ship practically the size of the Starshine itself, but somehow it was not quite substantial. For minutes it shimmered and quivered.

"You'll find it instructive," said Kim drily to the Mayor of Steadheim, "to look out of a stern-port."

The Mayor lumbered toward a stern-port. A moment later they heard him shout. Minutes later, he lumbered back.

"What's that?" he said angrily. "I thought it was another ship! 

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