to a
ring on Dowst's boat. The spacemen vanished through the valve, and the
massive door slid closed. The overhead lights flicked out. Rip now
snapped on his belt light, and the others followed suit.

In front of the boxlike landing boats a great door slid open, and air
from the lock rushed out. Rip knew it was only imagination, but he felt
as though all the heat from his suit was radiating into space, chilling
him to near absolute zero. Beyond the lights from their belts, he saw
stars and recognized the constellation for which the space cruiser was
named. A superstitious spaceman would have taken that as a good sign.
Rip admitted that it was nice to see.

"Float 'em," he ordered.

The Planeteers gripped handholds at the entrance with one hand and
launching rails on the boats with the other, then heaved. The boats
slid into space. As the safety lines tightened, the Planeteers were
pulled after the boat.

Rip left his feet with a little spring and shot through the door.
Directly below him, the asteroid gleamed darkly in the light of the tiny
sun. His first reaction was "Great Cosmos! What a little chunk of rock!"
But that was because he was used to looking from the space platform at
the great curve of Terra or at the big ball of the moon. Actually the
asteroid was fair-sized, when compared with most of its kind.

The Planeteers hauled themselves into the boats by their safety lines.
Rip waited until all were in, then pulled himself along his own line
to the black square of the door. Koa was waiting to give him a hand into
the craft.

The Planeteers were standing, except for Dowst. Rip had never seen an
old-type railroad, or he might have likened the landing boat to a
railroad boxcar. It was about the same size and shape, but had huge
"windows" on both sides and in front of the pilot--windows that were
not enclosed. The space-suited men needed no protection.

"Blast," Rip ordered.

A pulse of fire spurted from the top of each boat, driving them bottom
first toward the asteroid.

"Land at will," Rip said.

The asteroid loomed large as he looked through an opening. It was rocky,
but there were plenty of smooth places.

Dowst picked one. He was an expert pilot, and Rip watched him with
pleasure. The exhaust from the top lessened, and fire spurted soundlessly
from the bottom. Dowst balanced the opposite thrusts of the top and
bottom blasts with the delicacy of a woman threading a needle. In a few
moments the b