oo were in confusion, trying
to shove themselves toward the fallen women.

Miko roared:

"Light those tubes! Gregg Haljan! By the Almighty, Moa, are you up
there? What is wrong? The light-tubes--"

Dark drama of unknown plot! I wonder if I should try and leave the
turret. Where was Anita? She had been down there on the deck when I
flung out the lights.

I think twenty seconds would have covered it all. I had not moved. I
thought, "Is Snap concerned with this?"

Moa's knife could have stabbed me. I felt her lunge against me; and
suddenly I was gripping her, twisting her wrist. But she flung the knife
away. Her strength was almost the equal of my own. Her hand went for my
throat, and with the other hand she was fumbling.

* * * * *

The deck abruptly sprang into light again. Moa had found the switch and
threw it back.

"Gregg!"

She fought me as I tried to reach the switch. I saw down on the deck
Miko gazing up at us. Moa panted, "Gregg--stop! If he--sees you doing
this, he'll kill you--"

The scene down there was almost unchanged. I had answered my cue. To
what purpose? I saw Anita near Miko. The last of the women were on the
plank.

I had stopped struggling with Moa. She sat back, panting; and then she
called: "Sorry, Miko. It will not happen again."

Miko was in a towering rage. But he was too busy to bother with me; his
anger swung on those nearest him. He shoved the last of the women
violently at the incline. She bounded over. Her body, with the
gravity-pull of only a few Earth-pounds, sailed in an arc and dropped to
the sward near the swaying line of men.

Miko swung back. "Get out of my way!" A sweep of his huge arm knocked
Anita sidewise. "Prince, damn you, help me with those boxes!"

The frightened stewards were lifting the boxes, square metal
storage-chests each as long as a man, packed with food, tools, and
equipment.

"Here, get out of my way, all of you!"

My breath came again; Anita nimbly retreated before Miko's angry rush.
He dashed at the stewards. Three of them held a box. He took it from
them; raised it at the top of the incline. Poised it over his head an
instant, with his massive arms like gray pillars beneath it. And flung
it. The box catapulted, dropped; and then, passing the Planetara's
gravity area, it sailed in a long flat arc over the forest glade and
crashed into the purple underbrush.

"Give me another!"

* * * *