As the battered but stanch and powerful meteorboat floated slowly upward a desultory conversation was taking place in the dive he had left. At that early hour business was slack to the point of nonexistence, and Strongheart was chatting idly with a bartender and one of the hostesses.
"If more of the boys was like him, we wouldn't have no trouble at all," Strongheart stated with conviction. "Nice, quiet, easygoing—why, he didn't hardly damage a thing, for all his fun."
"Yeah, but at that maybe it's a good gag nobody riled him up too much," the barkeep opined. "He could be rough if he wanted to, I bet a quart. Drunk or sober, he's chain lightning with them DeLameters."
"He's so refined, such a perfect gentleman," sighed the woman. "He's nice." To her, he had been. She had had plenty of credits from the big miner, without having given anything save smiles and dances in return. "Them two guys he drilled must have needed killing, or he wouldn't have burned 'em."
And that was that. As the Lensman had intended, Wild Bill Williams was an old, known, and highly respected resident of Miners' Rest!
Out among the asteroids again; more muscle-tearing, back-breaking, lonesome labor. Kinnison did not find any more fabulously rich meteors—such things happen only once in a hundred lifetimes—but he was getting his share of heavy stuff. Then one day when he had about half a load there came, screaming in upon the emergency wave, a call for help; a call so loud that the ship broadcasting it must be very close indeed. Yes, there she was, right in his lap; startlingly large even upon the low-power plates of his spacetramp.
