noon?"

The Chief laughed. He'd known Sally, at least by sight, back at the
Kenmore plant.

"No, ma'am!" he told her. "Just askin'. I worked on that Red Canyon dam
job, years back. That dam that made the lake. It ought to be right
pretty around there now. Okay, Joe. See you as soon as work starts up.
In the mornin', most likely."

Joe started away with Sally. Mike the midget called hoarsely: "Joe! Just
a minute!"

Joe drew back. The midget's seamed face was very earnest. He said in his
odd voice: "Here's something to think about. Somebody worked mighty hard
to keep you from getting those gyros here. They might work hard to keep
them from getting repaired. That's why we asked for a special shop to
work in. It's occurred to me that a good way to stop these repairs would
be to stop us. Not everybody would've figured out how to rebalance this
thing. You get me?"

"Sure!" said Joe. "You three had better look out for yourselves."

Mike stared at him and grimaced.

"You don't get it," he said brittlely. "All right. I may be crazy, at
that."

Joe rejoined Sally. The idea of a picnic was brand new to him, but he
approved of it completely. They went to the small exit that led to the
security building. They were admitted. There was remarkable calm and
efficiency here, even though routine had been upset by the need to stop
all work. As they went toward Major Holt's office, Joe heard somebody
dictating in a matter-of-fact voice: "... this attempt at atomic
sabotage was defeated outside the Shed, but it never had a chance of
success. Geiger counters would have instantly shown any attempt to
smuggle radioactive material into the Shed...."

Joe glanced sidewise at Sally.

"That's for a publicity release?" he asked.

She nodded.

"It's true, too. Nothing goes in or out of the Shed without passing
close to a Geiger counter. Even radium-dial watches show up, though they
don't set the sirens to screaming."

Joe said: "I'll get my order for new parts off on the facsimile
machine."

But he had to get Major Holt's secretary to show him where to feed in
the list. It would go east to the nearest facsimile receiver, and then
be rushed by special messenger to the plant. Miss Ross gloomily set the
machine and initialed the delivery requisition which was part of the
document. It flashed through the scanning process and came out again.

"You and Sally," remarked Sally's father's secretary with a morose sigh,
"can go and relax th