ked a deep, resonant voice behind her.

She straightened from her anxious examination of Motwick. The squat man
was standing there, an apologetic look on his face.

She looked contemptuously at the massive muscles whose help had been
denied her. Her arm ached where the dark man had grasped it. The broad
face before her was not unhandsome, and the blue eyes were
disconcertingly direct, but she despised him for a coward.

"I'm sorry I couldn't fight those men for you, Miss, but I just
couldn't," he said miserably, as though reading her thoughts. "But no
one will bother you on the street if I'm with you."

"A lot of protection you'd be if they did!" she snapped. "But I'm
desperate. You can carry him to the Stellar Hotel for me."

* * * * *

The gravity of Ganymede was hardly more than that of Earth's moon, but
the way the man picked up the limp Motwick with one hand and tossed him
over a shoulder was startling: as though he lifted a feather pillow. He
followed Trella out the door of the Golden Satellite and fell in step
beside her. Immediately she was grateful for his presence. The dimly
lighted street was not crowded, but she didn't like the looks of the men
she saw.

The transparent dome of Jupiter's View was faintly visible in the
reflected night lights of the colonial city, but the lights were
overwhelmed by the giant, vari-colored disc of Jupiter itself, riding
high in the sky.

"I'm Quest Mansard, Miss," said her companion. "I'm just in from
Jupiter."

"I'm Trella Nuspar," she said, favoring him with a green-eyed glance.
"You mean Io, don't you--or Moon Five?"

"No," he said, grinning at her. He had an engaging grin, with even white
teeth. "I meant Jupiter."

"You're lying," she said flatly. "No one has ever landed on Jupiter. It
would be impossible to blast off again."

"My parents landed on Jupiter, and I blasted off from it," he said
soberly. "I was born there. Have you ever heard of Dr. Eriklund
Mansard?"

"I certainly have," she said, her interest taking a sudden upward turn.
"He developed the surgiscope, didn't he? But his ship was drawn into
Jupiter and lost."

"It was drawn into Jupiter, but he landed it successfully," said Quest.
"He and my mother lived on Jupiter until the oxygen equipment wore out
at last. I was born and brought up there, and I was finally able to
build a small rocket with a powerful enough drive to clear the planet."

She look