ss. I wish to ask this same
group to meet again for discussion of the details incident to this
transfer of operations. Let us say at ten o'clock in the morning,
gentlemen."

* * * * *

Hockley said goodbye to the envoy. Afterwards, he moved through the
circle of Senators to his own group. In the corridor they tightened
about him and followed along as if he had given an order for them to
follow him. He turned and attempted a grin.

"Looks like a bull session is in order, gents. Assembly in five minutes
in my office."

As he and Showalter opened the door to Miss Cardston's office and strode
in, the secretary looked up with a start. "I thought you were going to
meet in the conference room."

"We've met," said Hockley. "This is the aftermeeting. Send out for a
couple of cases of beer." He glanced at the number surging through the
doorway and fished in his billfold. "Better make it three. This ought to
cover it."

With disapproval, Miss Cardston picked up the bills and turned to the
phone. Almost simultaneously there was a bellow of protest and an
enormous, ham-like hand gripped her slender wrist. She glanced up in
momentary fright.

Dr. Forman K. Silvers was holding her wrist with one hand and clapping
Hockley on the back with the other. "This is not an occasion for beer,
my boy!" he said in an enormous voice. "Make that a case of champagne,
Miss Cardston." He released her and drew out his own billfold.

"Get somebody to bring in a couple of dozen chairs," Hockley said.

In his own office he walked to the window behind his desk and stood
facing it. The afternoon haze was coming up out of the ocean. Faintly
visible were the great buildings of the National Laboratories on the
other side of the city. Above the mist the sun caught the tip of the
eight story tower where the massive field tunnels of the newly designed
gammatron were to be installed.

Or _were_ to have been installed.

The gammatron was expected to make possible the creation of
gravitational fields up to five thousand g's. It would probably be a
mere toy to the Rykes, but Hockley felt a fierce pride in its creation.
Maybe that was childish. Maybe his whole feeling about the Lab was
childish. Perhaps the time had come to give up childish things and take
upon themselves adulthood.

But looking across the city at the concrete spire of the gammatron, he
didn't believe it.

He heard the clank of metal chairs as a couple