s_ of metallic mercury, and just as soon as
you can get it."

"Man, there isn't that much in the system."

"I know it. Get all there is on the market for me, and contract to take
all the 'Jupiter Heavy-Metals' can turn out. You send those orders
through, and clean out the market completely. Somebody's about to pay
for the work I've been doing, and boy, they're going to pay through the
nose. After you've got that order launched, and don't make a christening
party of the launching either, why just drop out here, and I'll show you
why the value of mercury is going so high you won't be able to follow it
in a space ship."

"The cost of that," said Faragaut, seriously now, "will be
about--fifty-three million at the market price. You'd have to put up
twenty-six cash, and I don't believe you've got it."

Buck laughed. "Tom, loan me a dozen million, will you? You send that
order through, and then come see what I've got. I've got a break, too!
Mercury's the best metal for this use--and it'll stop gamma rays too!"

"So it will--but for the love of the system, what of it?"

"Come and see--tonight. Will you send that order through?"

"I will, Buck. I hope you're right. Cash is tight now, and I'll probably
have to put up nearer twenty million, when all that buying goes through.
How long will it be tied up in that deal, do you think?"

"Not over three weeks. And I'll guarantee you three hundred percent--if
you'll stay in with me after you start. Otherwise--I don't think making
this money would be fair just now."

"I'll be out to see you in about two hours, Buck. Where are you? At the
estate?" asked Faragaut seriously.

"In my lab out there. Thanks, Tom."

McLaurin was there when Tom Faragaut arrived. And General Logan, and
Colonel Gerardhi. There was a restrained air of gratefulness about all
of them that Tom Faragaut couldn't quite understand. He had been looking
up Buck Kendall's famous bank, and more and more he had begun to wonder
just what was up. The list of stockholders had read like a list of IP
heroes and executives. The staff had been a list of IP men with a
slender sprinkling of accountants. And the sixty-million dollar
structure was to be a bank without advertising of any sort! Usually such
a venture is planned and published months in advance. This had sprung up
suddenly, with a strange quietness.

Almost silently, Buck Kendall led the way to the laboratory. A small
metal tank was supported in a peculiar piec