flaw of this plan was that Quirl himself would still be under
practical sentence of death. Strom would not let his gratitude carry
him so far as to release a man who knew as much as Quirl did, and who
would not promise to keep his secrets.

The preferable, though far more dangerous course was to strike before
the mutineers could. Quirl knew something about the structure of the
ship. It was built around the tubular passage, and every hold or group
of rooms opened on this well, from the bow where the navigators were
to the stern where the rockets were located. Somewhere there would be
a generating room where the invisibility field was being produced. If
he could find this and wreck the generators one of the I.F.P. ships
with which this part of space doubtless swarmed, would sight them, and
after that everything was in the hands of fate.

Quirl nervously waited for the guard to nod. At any moment he expected
to hear a hellish bedlam break loose--the beginning of the mutiny. And
the guard seemed alert. There was nothing to do but take a chance.

Quirl sighed as if he were turning in his sleep, so that the clink of
the released chain would not seem out of place. The guard did not
stir. Slowly, very slowly, Quirl crept across the floor. He had been
robbed of all his clothing except his torn silk trousers; and his
boots were gone, so he was able to move as quietly as a cat.

With tense silence he ascended the ladder, praying that his weight
would not send up a warning vibration. But his luck held. He was
nearly at the top before it broke.

"Take him off! Take him off!" It was an eery, strangled shriek from
one of the male prisoners in the throes of a nightmare. With a
startled curse the guard thudded to his feet, peered tensely into the
darkness, his weapon sending twin milky beams of the powerful ionizing
ray toward the source of the sound.

* * * * *

The dreamer had awakened, still gasping in the grip of fear, and other
disturbed sleepers were grumbling.

"Better go easy, you fools," the pirate warned them. "Yer just in luck
that I didn't let loose a couple bolts on ye. Got a good notion to do
it, anyway." He played the dangerous little spots of light around,
amused as the prisoners scrambled for safety, but with no real
intention of releasing the deadly electric charge along the paths
provided for it. This cruel pleasure cost him his life. As he turned
his back Quirl leaped. His iro