After two hours of shifting every one of the steward’s belongings, of crawling on hands and knees about the deck and climbing to inspect perfectly bare walls, they had found exactly nothing.  Rip sat down on the end of the denuded bunk.

“There’s the hydro—­Frank spent a lot of time in there—­and the storeroom,” he told the places off on his fingers.  “The galley and the mess cabin.”

Those had been the extent of Mura’s world.  They could search the storeroom, the galley and the mess cabin—­but to interfere with the hydro would endanger their air supply.  It was for that very reason that they now looked at each other in startled surmise.

“The perfect place to plant something!” Dane spoke first.

Rip’s teeth caught his underlip.  The hydro—­something planted there could not be routed out unless they made a landing on a port field and had the whole section stripped.

“Devilish—­” Rip’s mobile lips drew tight.  “But how could they do it?”

Dane didn’t see how it could have been done either.  No one but the Queen’s own crew had been on board the ship during their entire stay on Sargol, except for the young Salarik.  Could that cub have brought something?  But he and Mura had been with the youngster every minute that he had been in the hydro.  To the best of Dane’s memory the cub had touched nothing and had been there only for a few moments.  That had been before the feast also—­

Rip got to his feet.  “We can’t strip the hydro in space,” he pointed out the obvious quietly.

Dane had the answer.  “Then we’ve got to earth!”

“You heard that warn-off.  If we try it—­”

“What about an Emergency station?”

Rip stood very still, his big hands locked about the buckle of his arms belt.  Then, without another word, he went out of the cabin and at a pounding pace up the ladder, bound for the Captain’s cabin and the records Jellico kept there.  It was such a slim chance—­but it was better than none at all.

Dane shouldered into the small space in his wake to find Rip making a selection from the astrogation tapes.  There were E-Stats among the asteroids—­points prospectors or small traders in sudden difficulties might contact for supplies or repairs.  The big Companies maintained their own—­the Patrol had several for independents.

“No Patrol one—­”

Rip managed a smile.  “I haven’t gone space whirly yet,” was his comment.  He was feeding a tape into the reader on the Captain’s desk.  In the cage over his head the blue Hoobat squatted watching him intently—­for the first time since Dane could remember showing no sign of resentment by weird screams or wild spitting.

“Patrol E-Stat A-54—­” the reader squeaked.  Rip hit a key and the wire clicked to the next entry.  “Combine E-Stat—­” Another punch and click.  “Patrol E-Stat A-55—­” punch-click.  “Inter-Solar—­” this time Rip’s hand did not hit the key and the squeak continued—­“Co-ordinates—­” Rip reached for a steelo and jotted down the list of figures.