" cried Frank hotly. "Why shouldn't I speak to him?"

Again the general's voice was calm. "It's some trick of the Soviets'.
John Robeson no longer commands the Seventh Fleet."

"But sir," began the com officer. "He's on the coded frequency, and
the voice match---"

"I SAID, cut him off."

.....

And then Frank did it. He uttered the simple (and often just) word
that no subordinate, any time, anywhere, in any army of men, is ever
allowed to speak.

"No."

"What the hell do you mean, NO!" And suddenly all Hayes' former fury
returned. His face distorted wildly, and the veins of his skull and
neck stood out further still.

"I've known John Robeson for thirty years. There's no way he would do
anything..... It's YOU I don't trust. No more running. No more
hiding from the truth." He turned to the terrified young man, whose
eyes moved back and forth between them. "Soldier, open that channel."

"You, traitorous, DOG!" screamed Hayes, and began to rush at him,
heedless.

But all at once he stopped, and stood perfectly still. His right
eyebrow twitched strangely, and the whole face began to work in comic
spasms.

He collapsed to the floor, where Calder caught him up, and rested the
beloved head on his knee. The general's trembling jaw uttered sounds
but could not, as it struggled so desperately to do, create
intelligible speech. Charles William Hayes had suffered a massive
stroke, and lay dying in his soldier's arms.

"Get a doctor in here, quickly," ordered Frank, once again his own
master. Then turning to the com-man, "Put Robeson on visual, apprise
him of our status, and tell him I'll be with him as soon as I can."

At that moment the only son of William and Charlotte Hayes gave up his
spirit, trying to tell his only friend that he loved him.

"You can't....." blubbered Calder. "No, please, no." Their foreheads
met, and he wept.

Frank approached him, and put a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. "I'm
sorry, Michael. I truly am. But he would have led us all to ruin."

"You!" shocked Calder through his tears. "YOU killed him..... He was
going to save us!" And in a sudden fury of determination like that of
his dead idol, he seized the pistol and Hayes' hip. And as the other
moved away, waving NO with his hands in front of him, shot Frank in the
chest and killed him.

Calder lowered his master's body gently. Then rising, holding the
weapon still, looked about him and brandished it fie