“They could,” Dar said judiciously, “but I don’t think they will. Those pirates’re going to be very good at running. If they’re not, they lose profits. So they’ll take risks the police won’t.”

“Like going into H-space too soon?”

“That’s possible. If you see a big explosion, you’ll know they tried it.”

They waited, staring ahead, where the police ship had dwindled to a glint of light.

After a while, Sam ventured, “I don’t think they tried it.”

A speck of light glinted in the distance. Dar’s finger sprang out to the power button again.

“Not yet!” Sam cried. “We don’t know who won!”

“I bet we’re gonna find out, though.” Dar waited, tense.

The glint grew into a dot, and kept growing.

It became a triangular dot.

“Victory!” Dar stabbed the button, and the engine roared into life. “Let’s hear it for the good guys!” He hauled back on the wheel, and the boat sprang up out of the plane of the ecliptic, toward the police ship.

“Shouldn’t we identify ourselves? So they don’t think we’re attacking?”

“Not as ridiculous as it sounds,” Dar said soberly. “For all they know, we could be a torpedo. There oughta be some kinda distress beacon around here. See if you can find it, will ya?”

It was labeled “Distress Beacon,” and it only had one button. Sam pressed it, and waited.

“How do we know if it’s working?” she said finally.

“How do you know God listens?” Dar retorted. “It’s got radio; we don’t.”

“Faith,” Sam grumbled. “Does it always have to come down to that?”

The pyramid loomed up toward them—and disappeared in a cloud of steam.

“They heard us!” Dar yelped. “They’re decelerating!”

The fog cleared, and the police ship towered over them.

Sam shrank back. “I can’t help it—I feel as though it’s going to fall on me!”

And it did. The great pyramid sank toward them, giving them a fly’s-eye view of a giant foot. Dar opened his mouth to scream just as a hatch slid open in the huge silver wall above them, swooping down to swallow them up.

“Saved?” someone croaked. Dar would’ve thought it was Sam, but it was coming from inside his own head.

“Just glad we were nearby.” The captain poured two glasses of brandy and held them out to Sam and Dar. His insignia gleamed on the breast of his doublet—an eye-topped pyramid with “Space Police” inside it in cursive script. Arcing above it were the words, “Hal. IV,” and, below it, “Falstaff.” It stood out in a sea of ocher—no, maybe an ocean. The captain was obese, to say the least. So was his crew—the smallest of them was at least four feet around, and all were shorter than Dar. The captain also had the typical Haldane IV face: florid, with long curly hair and a jawline beard.

Dar accepted the brandy eagerly, but Sam held up a palm. “Thanks, but I don’t believe in alcohol.”

The captain blinked in surprise. “I assure you, it exists.”

“We were lucky you were in the neighborhood,” Dar said quickly.

“Well, it wasn’t entirely luck,” the captain admitted. “We have had reports about pirates trying to ambush merchantmen at the H-space jump points. But last week a freighter full of pickled herring that was supposed to come through this way, didn’t—so we decided to guard this jump point. We only have this one patrol cruiser, so you’ll understand that we couldn’t guard all the points.”

“And the load of pickled herring was that important?” Dar said in surprise.

“To us,” said the captain, “it’s vital. But what brings you to Falstaff, gentlefolk?”

“ ‘Falstaff’?” Dar frowned, puzzled.

“It’s the local name for Haldane IV,” Sam explained. “Just here to make a connection, Captain. We’re inbound from Wolmar.”

The captain still sat comfortably leaning back, fingers laced across his butterbelly, but suddenly he was all vigilance. “Wolmar? Really! How interesting. By the way, could I see your papers?”

“Hm? Oh, sure!” Dar slid his passport and ID out of his jacket pocket and laid them on the desk; Sam followed suit. “Sorry; we should have thought of that right off.”

“Well, you were a little flustered.” The captain picked up their passports and suddenly, illogically, Dar had the insane conviction that the captain had a jeweler’s loupe in his eye.

“Everything in order—of course.” The last part lacked conviction. The captain slid their papers back to them. “We don’t get many coming from Wolmar.”

“The traffic does seem to run the other way,” Dar agreed. “But our pharmaceutical materials company’s getting itchy to expand, and we’re heading back to the inner planets to sound out possible investors.” Sam twitched; Dar reflected that he really should have told her about the cover story he was dreaming up.

“Didn’t realize it was getting to be that big a business.” The captain seemed genuinely interested.

Dar grinned. “It may not be—but we’re sure going to find out. By the way, I was mightily relieved when you noticed our boat so quickly. Were you on the lookout for us?”

“No, not particularly.” The captain frowned. “Should we have been?”

Dar sat still for a moment, letting the shock wash through him.

“Well,” he said carefully, “I would’ve thought our courier ship would’ve told you we were missing.”

“That is strange, now that you mention it.” The captain scratched his head, then looked up. “Maybe the pilot didn’t notice you’d abandoned ship.”

“Uh … could be.” Dar thought of how much of a lurch the lifeboat must’ve given the courier ship when it blasted free. “Of course—now that I think about it, that must be it. After all, how could the pilot have noticed we were gone?”

“How couldn’t he’ve noticed?” Dar raged. “When that lifeboat blasted free, it must’ve kicked the ship like a foundation anomaly!”

“Maybe he thought it was a blaster bolt,” Sam offered. “It was a little hectic just then.”

“And he wouldn’t’ve checked the passengers when the action was over?” Dar shook his head. “No. It washes about as well as baked-on grease.”

They were strolling through the downtown section of Haskerville, the capital of Falstaff. The street was wide, but all the buildings had a second story that projected out over the sidewalk—convenient in rainy weather, Dar was sure, but a little depressing on a sunny day. Also, it was a little strange that all the buildings were half-timbered and stuccoed.

“Well, it’s a frontier planet, I guess,” he said aloud.

“Not really—it’s a third of the way back to Terra, and it’s been colonized for four hundred years. What makes you think so?”

“The architecture.” Dar pointed to the wooden beams. “Don’t they know how to make steel?”

“Oh, they know how, well enough.” Sam smiled. “I asked about it on my way out here. Seems there’s very little free metal on Falstaff. Even the iron’s all locked up in rust, in the soil.”

“Oh.” Dar pursed his lips. “So what do I use for money here—nails?”

Sam started, surprised. “How’d you guess?”

“You’re kidding!”

“Think so, do you? Well, just try to pay for something with an I.D.E. BTU credit here.”

“I’ll take your word for it.” Dar stopped by a storefront, looking up at the sign. “I think this is the place we’re looking for. Maybe they do money-changing here.”

“Makes sense,” Sam agreed, “so probably they don’t.”

They went into the ticket office of Outworld Interstellar Starship Enterprises, Unltd.

“Help you?” the clerk grunted around his sausage, his eyes on the newsfax. He was grossly fat, and jowly, like all the Falstavians they’d seen. In fact, Dar was beginning to feel like a freak—he was slim.

“Uh, yeah. We’d like to book passage to Terra.”

“Sure thing.” The man pulled out two tickets without even looking. “That’ll be two hundred pounds. Next ship lifts at fourteen hundred hours, May third.”