ver
six feet.

He felt his face flushing with sudden anger. Birken was running as best
he could toward the spaceship, and had covered nearly half the distance.

Kinton ran at the Tepoktans, brushing aside the concerned Klaft. He
snatched the heavy weapon from the surprised constable.

He turned and raised it to his chest. Because of the shortness of
Tepoktan arms, the launcher was constructed so that the butt rested
against the chest with the sighting loops before the eyes. The little
rocket tubes were above head height, to prevent the handler's catching
the blast.

The circles of the sights weaved and danced about the running figure.
Kinton realized to his surprise that the effort of seizing the weapon
had him panting. Or was it the fright at having a spear thrown at him?
He decided that Birken had not come close enough for that, and wondered
if he was afraid of his own impending action.

It wasn't fair, he complained to himself. The poor slob only had a
spear, and a man couldn't blame him for wanting to get back to his own
sort. He was limping ... hurt ... how could they expect him to
realize--?

Then, abruptly, his lips tightened to a thin line. The sights steadied
on Birken as the latter approached the foot of the ladder leading to the
entrance port of the spaceship.

Kinton pressed the firing stud.

Across the hundred-yard space streaked four flaring little projectiles.
Kinton, without exactly seeing each, was aware of the general lines of
flight diverging gradually to bracket the figure of Birken.

One struck the ground beside the man just as he set one foot on the
bottom rung of the ladder, and skittered away past one fin of the ship
before exploding. Two others burst against the hull, scattering metal
fragments, and another puffed on the upright of the ladder just above
Birken's head.

* * * * *

The spaceman was blown back from the ladder. He balanced on his heels
for a moment with outstretched fingers reaching toward the grips from
which they had been torn. Then he crumpled into a limp huddle on the
yellowing turf.

Kinton sighed.

The constable took the weapon from him, reloaded deftly, and proffered
it again. When the Terran did not reach for it, the officer held out a
clawed hand to receive it. He gestured silently, and the constable
trotted across the intervening ground to bend over Birken.

"He is dead," said Klaft when the constable straightened up with a