“Aren’t what?”
“Aren’t anything. They’re empty crates. Something went wrong with the crating machine and they never knew it.”
“Are you sure that’s what those crates were supposed to contain?”
“Sure I’m sure. Everything else on the order came, and the ladings specified the steel for those particular crates.” He ran a hand through his tousled hair. It made him look more like an airedale than he usually does.
I grinned at him. “Maybe it’s invisible steel.”
“Invisible, weightless and intangible. Can I word the message to Center telling them about it?”
“Go as far as you like,” I told him. “Wait here a minute, though. I’ll show Mike where her quarters are and then I want to talk to you a minute.”
I took Michaelina to the best available sleeping cabin of the cluster around headquarters. She thanked me again for trying to get Ike a job here, and I felt lower than a widgie bird’s grave when I went back to my office.
“Yeah, chief?” Reagan said.
“About that message to Earth,” I told him. “I mean the one I sent this morning. I don’t want you to say anything about it to Michaelina.”