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.”
    “You mean not yet. You did fill his face with pepper, though. Why didn’t you have the sense to leave him be, instead of going in for this perfectly ridiculous amateur burglary?”
    “What do you mean, ‘sense’? Damn it, woman, I’m in charge and I won’t be yelled at . . .”
    “Who’s yelling at whom?”
    “You are!” he shouted.
    “I AM NOT YELLING!”
    “YOU ARE TOO!” Chapman took a firm grip on himself and laughed. “So’m I. Let’s not fight; at least, not each other.”
    “But what’ll we do? There’s nothing usable except this one pair of swim trunks, and we can’t give a showing with that.”
    “We could give a sensational showing,” he said, “but the Osirians wouldn’t appreciate it.”
    “There’s no way of turning back, say by being transferred to another ship, is there?”
    “Certainly not. We’ve got enough energy stored in us, just from the speed we’re going, to—to—”
    They both held their heads. Ceila Zorn finally said: “I knew nothing would come of letting you and Miss Nettie talk me into this crazy expedition. Even if we live to get back, the old hell-cat will fire us.”
    Chapman looked up. “There’s one chance left.” He took out his wallet and stuffed it up his sleeve.
    “Cato! Are you planning something reckless?”
    “You’ll see. Anyway, what have we got to lose?”
    In the saloon, the first shift had just finished breakfast and were making way for the second. Chapman pushed towards Bergerat, said: “All right, you . . .” adding several fruity epithets, and punched Bergerat’s nose.
    Instantly, the saloon was filled with yells, silverware, and confusion. Bergerat got back one good right to Chapman’s mouth before they clinched and fell, threshing about in the little space between the two tables.
    “Stop this at once!” shouted an authoritative voice in Brazilo-Portuguese, and Chapman felt himself plucked from his antagonist. Captain Almeida was roaring at him: “Are you mad, man? What is the meaning of this outrage?”
    “This twerp,” said Chapman, blood trickling down his chin, “dopes me with a knock-out drop, picks my pocket, and puts an acid bomb in my sample trunk to ruin my stock, and you call it an outrage when I poke him one?”
    “Liar!” said Bergerat. “I gave him a swallow of cognac and he passed out. Can I help it if he has no head for good liquor? I know nothing about his trunk and I never picked his pocket. Let me at the cheap chiseler . . .”
    “Look in his pockets,” said Chapman.
    Zuloaga ran his hands over Bergerat’s body and found Chapman’s wallet.
    “You see?” said Chapman.
    “But—but I have no idea how that got there,” said Bergerat. “He must have planted it while we were fighting . . .”
    By now, however, Chapman had obviously captured the sympathy of the officers. “Let me show you my trunk,” he said.
    He showed them the remains of the samples, Bergerat denying his guilt all the while. Chapman thought with an inward chuckle that he could never have proved that Bergerat had done the crime he had committed if he hadn’t first convinced the authorities that Bergerat had done another one he hadn’t.
    Bergerat said: “I came to see Mr. Chapman because I had just had another encounter with him in the baggage room.” He went on with an account of his peppery experience.
    “He’s making that up,” said Chapman. “He has to have something to say, I suppose. Let’s look at that trunk of his; maybe it’s full of stolen goods.”
    They went down the hall, where the captain opened the baggage-room door. Chapman had a moment of panic lest somebody think to ask Gustafson what Mr. Chapman had been doing all that time in the machine shop. But nobody did, and Bergerat’s trunk proved undisturbed.
    “Open it,” said the captain.
    Bergerat complied. Inside was a mass of neatly hung summer wear, mostly female: sunsuits, bathing-suits, tennis clothes, and the like. None of the other passengers