"What are you, a mind reader or something?" Crandall burst out.
"Something like that," Kinnison assented with a grin.
Blakeslee put in, "More than that, you mean. Something like hypnosis, only more so. You think that I had something to do with this, but I didn't. The Lensman did it all himself."
"Um-m-m." Crandall stared at Kinnison, new respect in his eyes. "I knew that unattached Lensmen were good, but I had no idea they were that good. No wonder Helmuth has been getting his wind up about you. I'll string along with any one who can take a whole base, single-handed, and make such a bally ass to boot out of such a keen old bird as Helmuth is. But I'm in a bit of a dither, not to say a funk, about what is going to happen when we pop into Prime Base without you. Every man jack of us, you know, is slated for the lethal chamber without trial. Miss MacDougall will do her bit, of course, but what I mean is, has she enough jets to swing it?"
"I think that she has; but to avoid all argument I've fixed that up, too. Here's a tape, telling all about what happened. It ends up with my recommendation for a full pardon for each of you, and for a job at whatever he is found best fitted for. It is signed with my thumb print. Give it or send it to Port Admiral Haynes as soon as you land. I've got enough jets, I think, so that it will go as it lays."
"Jets? You? Right-o! You've got jets enough to lift fourteen freighters off the North Pole of Valeria. What next?"
"Stores and supplies for my speedster. I'm doing a long flit and this ship has supplies to burn, so I'd like to have my little can loaded, Plimsoll down."
The speedster was stocked forthwith. Then, with nothing more than a casually waved salute in the way of farewell, Kinnison boarded his tiny space ship and shot away toward his distant goal. Crandall, the pilot, sought his bunk; while Blakeslee started his long trick at the board. In an hour or so the head nurse strolled in.
"Kim?" she queried, doubtfully.