er the salvage
equipment into the Antares's lock compartment. Then Miss Mines sealed
the Mooncat and went back upstairs. Dasinger climbed into one of the
three salvage suits, hung the wrist communicator inside the helmet,
snapped on the suit's lights and went over to the edge of the
compartment deck. Black water reflected the lights thirty feet below. He
checked the assortment of tools attached to his belt, nudged the suit's
gravity cutoff to the right, energized magnetic pads on knees, boot tips
and wrists, then fly-walked rapidly down a bulkhead and dropped into the
water.

"No go, Duomart!" he informed the girl ten minutes later, his voice
heavy with disappointment. "It's an ungodly twisted mess down here ...
worse than I thought it might be! Looks as if we'll have to cut all the
way through to that vault. Give Egavine the signal to start herding the
boys down."

Approximately an hour afterwards, Miss Mines reported urgently through
the communicator, "They'll reach the lock in less than four minutes now,
Dasinger! Better drop it and come up!"

"I'm on my way." Dasinger reluctantly switched off the beam-saw he was
working with, fastened it to the belt of the salvage suit, turned in the
murky water and started back towards the upper sections of the wreck.
The job of getting through the tangled jungle of metal and plastic to
the gem vault appeared no more than half completed, and the prospect of
being delayed over it until the Spy discovered them here began to look
like a disagreeably definite possibility. He clambered and floated
hurriedly up through the almost vertical passage he'd cleared, found
daylight flooding the lock compartment, the system's yellow sun well
above the horizon. Peeling off the salvage suit, he restored the
communicator to his wrist and went over to the head of the ramp.

* * * * *

The five men came filing down the last slopes in the morning light,
Taunus and Calat in the lead, Graylock behind them, the winged animal
riding his shoulder and lifting occasionally into the air to flutter
about the group. Quist and Egavine brought up the rear. Dasinger took
the gun from his pocket.

"I'll clip my gun to the suit belt when I go back down in the water with
the boys," he told the communicator. "If the doctor's turning any tricks
over in his mind, that should give him food for thought. I'll relieve
Quist of his weapon as he comes in."

"What about the guns in Grayl