e Soviet Union had no intention
of actually starting an atomic war at that time. If she had, she would
have shot first and made excuses afterwards. But she _had_ hoped to make
good propaganda usage of the blast.

The Peiping Explosion had caused widespread death and destruction, yes;
but it had also ended up being the fastest slum-clearance project on
record. The rebuilding had taken somewhat more time than the clearing
had taken, but the results had been a new Peiping--a modern city in
every respect. And nowhere else on Earth was there one hundred square
miles of _completely_ modern city. Alteration takes longer than starting
from scratch if the techniques are available; there isn't so much dead
wood to clear away.

In the middle of the city, the Chinese government had built its
equivalent of the Kremlin--nearly a third of a square mile of
ultra-modern buildings designed to house every function of the Communist
Government of China. It had taken slave labor to do the job, but the job
had been done.

A little more than half a mile on a side, the area was surrounded by a
wall that had been designed after the Great Wall of China. It stood
twenty-five feet high and looked very quaint and picturesque.

And somewhere inside it James Ch'ien, American-born physicist, was being
held prisoner. Spencer Candron, alias Mr. Ying Lee, had to get him out.

Dr. Ch'ien was important. The government of the United States knew he
was important, but they did not yet know _how_ important he was.

* * * * *

Man had already reached the Moon and returned. The Martian expedition
had landed safely, but had not yet returned. No one had heard from the
Venusian expedition, and it was presumed lost. But the Moon was being
jointly claimed by Russian and American suits at the United Nations,
while the United Nations itself was trying to establish a claim. The
Martian expedition was American, but a Russian ship was due to land in
two months. The lost Venusian expedition had been Russian, and the
United States was ready to send a ship there.

After nearly forty years, the Cold War was still going on, but now the
scale had expanded from the global to the interplanetary.

And now, up-and-coming China, defying the Western Powers and arrogantly
ignoring her Soviet allies, had decided to get into the race late and
win it if she could.

And she very likely could, if she could exploit the abilities of James
Ch'ien to t