"I know a chap who owns and operates a small steel plant, so insignificant, relatively, that he has not yet been bought out or frozen out by Steel. I was able to do him a small favor once, and I am sure that he will be glad to return it. We will not be able to oversee the work, that is a drawback. We can get MacDougall to do it for us, however, and with him doing the work we can rest assured that there will be nothing off color. Even Steel couldn't buy him."
"MacDougall! The man who installed the Intercontinental plant? He wouldn't touch a little job like this with a pole!"
"I think he would. He and I are rather friendly, and after I tell him all about it he will be glad to take it. It means building the first interplanetary vessel, you know."
"Wouldn't Steel follow him up if he should go to work on a mysterious project? He's too big to hide."
"No. He will go camping—he often does. I have gone with him several times when we were completely out of touch with civilization for two months at a time. Now, about the ship we want. Have you any ideas?"
"It will cost more than our entire capital."
"That is easily arranged. We do not care how much it costs."
Seaton began to object to drawing so heavily upon the resources of his friend, but was promptly silenced.
"I told you when we started," Crane said flatly, "that your solution and your idea are worth far more than half a million. In fact, they are worth more than everything I have. No more talk of the money end of it, Dick."
"All right. We'll build a regular go-getter. Four times the size—she'll be a bear-cat, Mart. I'm glad this one is on the fritz. She'll carry a two-hundred-pound bar—Zowie! Watch our smoke! And say, why wouldn't it be a good idea to build an attractor—a thing like an object-compass, but mounting a ten-pound bar instead of a needle, so that if they chase us in space we can reach out and grab 'em? We might mount a machine-gun in each quadrant, shooting X-plosive bullets, through pressure gaskets in the walls. We should have something for defense—I don't like the possibility of having that gang of pirates after us, and nothing to fight back with except thought-waves."