be?" asked Senator Humper unceremoniously.
"Oh, about ten of your years, at a guess."
"Ten years! My God, man. Can't you do something sooner?"
"Well--I suppose, I could administer the first two parts of the testmyself. Why, yes, I suppose I could drop off your samples and yourspecimen at the Federation branch laboratory in Andromeda--."
"Wonderful!" shouted Beemish. "When do we begin?"
He was genuinely awed when three weeks later they began loadingenormous quantities of Z-67As into his ship. He did not check thestuff, but had no doubts that it was, atom for atom, identical to thesample of fuel he had given them.
The R37Ax computor missiles arrived the same afternoon. There were fourhundred of them. He selected one at random and had it taken into theship's laboratory. Here, he ran a number of routine tests. The missilewas not identical to the sample! They had made a number of improvementsin the circuitry! Keeter reflected grimly that a race such as thiswould probably be able to deduce a launching and firing system for thething, would probably have the planet ringed with launching stationswithin weeks. If the Blues _had_ picked up a trace of him, hereflected, they would be atomized before they got within half a millionmiles of the planet.
The specimen for genetics, which he had almost forgotten about, arrivedan hour before he was scheduled to depart. He was stunned again. Shewas undoubtedly the most attractive woman Keeter had ever set eyes on.
"Oh, I'm so excited," said the young lady, in a voice slightlysuggestive of the virgin on the way to the sacrifice.
"I'm excited, too," said Keeter honestly.
In the control room, Keeter set a course for Arcturus. He then trippeda lever which fed a month's supply of the earthmen's fuel into theship's almost empty reaction chambers. Another lever fed 50 computormissiles into 50 completely empty launching racks.
He checked the detectors, but found no trace of the blue ships of theFederation Patrol. Keeter allowed himself the luxury of a sigh. It wasa long way to Arcturus, a long, lonely way--even for a hardened pirate,he reflected sadly. Then he remembered that that was why he had askedfor the girl.
THE END
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