s are looking at us. The captain said to find out
what caused the fire, then get the hell back. So let's go."

"Don't miss your ship," the computer man said to Brion, and
he started for the pinnace. Then he hesitated and turned. "Sure
there's nothing we can do for you?"

Sorrow would accomplish nothing. Brion fought to sweep the dregs
of emotion from his mind and to think clearly. "You can help me,"
he said. "I could use a scalpel or any other surgical instrument
you might have." Lea would need those. Then he remembered Telt's
undelivered message. "Do you have a portable radio transceiver?
I can pay you for it."

The computer man vanished inside the rocket and reappeared a minute
later with a small package. "There's a scalpel and a magnetized
tweezers in here--all I could find in the med kit. Hope they'll do."
He reached inside and swung out the metal case of a self-contained
transceiver. "Take this, it's got plenty of range, even on the
longer frequencies."

He raised his hand at Brion's offer to pay. "My donation," he said.
"If you can save this planet I'll give you the whole pinnace as
well. We'll tell the captain we lost the radio in some trouble with
the natives. Isn't that right, Moneybags?" He prodded the purser
in the chest with a finger that would have punched a hole through
a weaker man.

"I read you loud and clear," the purser said. "I'll make out an
invoice so stating, back in the ship." They were both in the pinnace
then, and Brion had to move fast to get clear of the takeoff blast.

A sense of obligation--the spacemen had felt it too. The realization
of this raised Brion's spirits a bit as he searched through the
rubble for anything useful. He recognized part of a wall still
standing as a corner of the laboratory. Poking through the ruins, he
unearthed broken instruments and a single, battered case that had
barely missed destruction. Inside was the binocular microscope, the
right tube bent, its lenses cracked and obscured. The left eyepiece
still seemed to be functioning. Brion carefully put it back in the
case.

He looked at his watch. It was almost noon. These few pieces of
equipment would have to do for the dissection. Watched suspiciously
by the onlooking Disans, he started back to the warehouse. It was a
long, circuitous walk, since he didn't dare give any clues to his
destination. Only when he was positive he had not been observed or
followed did he slip through the building's entrance, loc