Dane Thorson, Cargo-master-apprentice of the Solar Queen, Galactic Free Trader spacer, Terra registry, stood in the middle of the ship’s cramped bather while Rip Shannon, assistant Astrogator and his ...

“That’s far enough, Eysie!” Although Traders by law and tradition carried no more potent personal weapons⁠—except in times of great crisis⁠—than hand sleep rods, the resultant shot from the latter was...

“What in⁠—” Frank Mura, steward, storekeeper, and cook of the Queen, retreated into the nearest cabin doorway as the young Salarik flashed down the ladder into his section. Dane, with the now-resigned...

But the interruption had disturbed the tenor of trading. The small chief who had so eagerly taken Paft’s place had only two Koros stones to offer and even to Dane’s inexperienced eyes they were inferi...

The gorp hunters straggled through the grass forest in family groups, and the Terrans saw that the enterprise had forced another uneasy truce upon the district, for there were representatives from mor...

Inside the red stockade there was a crowded community. The Salariki demanded privacy of a kind, and even the unmarried warriors did not share barracks, but each had a small cubicle of his own. So that...

The morning winds rustled through the grass forest and, closer to hand, it pulled at the cloaks of the Salariki. Clan nobles sat on stools, lesser folk squatted on the trampled stubble of the cleared ...

They lifted from Sargol on schedule and went into Hyper also on schedule. From that point on there was nothing to do but wait out the usual dull time of flight between systems and hope that Steen Wilc...

Jellico and Steen Wilcox pored over the few notes Tau had made before he was stricken. But apparently the Medic had found nothing to indicate that Sinbad was the carrier of any disease. Meanwhile the ...

Since Mura was in the isolation of ship sick bay the stripping of his cabin was a relatively simple job. But, though Rip and Dane went over it literally by inches, they found nothing unusual⁠—in fact ...

Measured in distance and time that rough walk in the ponderous suits across the broken terrain of the asteroid was a short one; measured by the beating of his own heart, Dane thought it much too long....

“All right, so we think we know a little more,” Ali added a moment later. “Just what are we going to do? We can’t stay in space forever⁠—there’re the small items of fuel and supplies and⁠—” Rip had co...

Across the lock of the panel was the seal set in place by Van Rycke before the spacer had lifted from Sargol. Under Dane’s inspection it showed no crack. To all evidence the hatch had not been opened ...

That click, the dial beneath the counter, warned them that they were as cut off from the luxuriance outside as if they were viewing a scene on Mars or Sargol from their present position. To go beyond ...

Fortunately the path out of the straggling town was a twisted one and in a very short space they were hidden from view. Dane paused as if the pace was too much for an injured man. The Medic put out a ...

Oddly enough, in spite of the tension which must have boiled within him, Rip brought them in with a perfect four-fin-point landing⁠—one which, under the circumstances, must win him the respect of mast...

“To those of you who do not travel the star trails our case may seem puzzling⁠—” the words were coming easily. Dane gathered confidence as he spoke, intent on making those others out there know what i...

“⁠—and so we landed here, sir,” Rip concluded his report in the matter-of-fact tone he might have used in describing a perfectly ordinary voyage, say between Terraport and Luna City, a run of no incid...