e doorway toward the base of the
mooring tower.

Ward descended to the ground in the small cage of the tower elevator. He
stepped out onto the soft, flaky soil of Mars as the man he had seen
from above came up to the tower.

"Lieutenant Harrison reporting for duty, sir," he said. He saluted and
noticed with a certain satisfaction the other's embarrassment at this
military recognition which he didn't deserve.

"My name is Halliday," the man said, after a short awkward pause. He
extended his hand. "I'm certainly glad to have you here, Lieutenant."

As Ward shook hands, he appraised the man carefully, and found nothing
in his examination to change his previously acquired opinion.

Thomas Halliday was small and stooped, with sallow features and
nervously shifting eyes, which looked startlingly large behind thick
strong glasses. His hair was thin and faded brown in color. There was a
peculiar tight look about his mouth and jaw, as if he were in a
continual state of faint exasperation.

This, thought Ward, was the man who had been holding up the development
of this area for three years. And, looking at him, it was easy to see
why.

Ward had his bag in his hand. Halliday, noticing it, asked, "Did you
bring any arms with you?"

Ward patted the raytube in the smart military holster at his hip.

"Just this," he said. He added drily, "Expecting trouble?"

"No," Halliday answered. His eyes shifted from Ward's and swept about in
a long inspection of the vast, sprawling, deserted terrain that
stretched away on all four sides like a boundless ocean.

"But," he added, "it's when you're not expecting trouble that you're
most likely to run into it."

* * * * *

Ward smiled to himself as he followed Halliday's thin stooped figure to
the main building, a squat solid structure of heavy _duralloy_ steel,
with only one door and no windows at all.

The man was obviously a neurotic mass of nerves, or else he was
indulging in a bit of melodrama to impress his new assistant.

Halliday stepped aside at the door and Ward preceded him into the hot,
sparsely furnished room. Halliday followed him, closing the door behind
him and setting the mechanism of a powerful automatic lock before
turning to Ward with an apologetic little smile.

"You'll find it rather cramped at first," he said. "I'll sleep out here
and you can use the storeroom as a bedroom. That's all the living
quarters we have, excepting the