just that--somebody's last sound. I _knew_ somebody was going to kill
me before I could find the switch. Then I stumbled over something, and
my hair stood on end. I guess my own yell was pretty horrible. It
scared me worse than I was already. But my fingers found the switch
somehow, and the light flashed on.

Sam lay on the floor, with blood still running from a wide gash
across his throat. A big kitchen knife was still stuck in one end of
the horrible wound. And one of his fingers was half sliced off where
the blade of a switch-blade shiv had failed on him and snapped back.

Something sounded above me, and I jerked back. But it was Captain
Muller, coming down the rail. The man had obviously taken it all in on
the way down. He jerked the switch-blade out of Sam's dead grasp and
looked at the point of the knife. There was blood further back from
the cut finger, but none on the point.

"Damn!" Muller tossed it down in disgust. "If he'd scratched the other
man, we'd have had a chance to find who it was. Tremaine, have you got
an alibi?"

"I was with Jenny," I told him, and watched his eyes begin to hate me.
But he nodded. We picked Sam up together and lugged his body up to the
top of the shaft, where the crowd had collected. Pietro, Peters, the
cook, Grundy and Lomax were there. Beyond them, the dark-haired,
almost masculine head of Eve Nolan showed, her eyes studying the body
of Sam as if it were a negative in her darkroom; as usual, Bill
Sanderson was as close to her as he could get. But there was no sign
now of Jenny. I glanced up the corridor but saw only Wilcox and Phil
Riggs, with Walt Harris trailing them, rubbing the sleep out of his
eyes.

Muller moved directly to Pietro. "Six left in my crew now, Dr. Pietro.
First Hendrix, now Sam. Can you still say that the attack is on _your_
crew--when mine keep being killed? This time, sir, I demand . . ."

"Give 'em hell, Captain," ape-man Grundy broke in. "Cut the fancy
stuff, and let's get the damned murdering rats!"

Muller's eyes quartered him, spitted his carcass, and began turning
him slowly over a bed of coals. "Mister Grundy, I am master of the
_Wahoo_. I fail to remember asking for your piratical advice. Dr.
Pietro, I trust you will have no objections if I ask Mr. Peters to
investigate your section and group thoroughly?"

"None at all, Captain Muller," Pietro answered. "I trust Peters. And I
feel sure you'll permit me to delegate Mr. Tremaine to inspect th