"Then I must have been right, that day I thought I heard a ship," Mrs. Carver declared.
"You must have been," Jak agreed.
"But what's Bogin doing out here?" Jon asked with a touch of fear in his voice.
"Nothing good, you can bet." His father's voice was grimmer than any of them had ever heard it before. "Any time you run across that pirate, you can lay mighty big odds there's skullduggery afoot."
"Great catfish! He's trying to beat us out of this system."
"I'll lay a thousand to one he is, if he thinks he can get away with it."
"What can we do about it, Father?" There was now a trace of a tremor in Jak's voice. "Jon and I have worked so hard to map these planets—how can Bogin possibly do the same and still beat us?"
"No telling. He's a slippery cuss, and if he really wants to try claim-jumping, he'll figure out some dirty scheme."
"Can't we get back to Earth ahead of him, Mr. C., and report to the Colonial Board first?" Mrs. Carver was almost in tears.
Her husband gave her a tight-lipped smile. "We'll sure try, Honey." His forehead creased with a frown of concentration for some minutes, then he faced Jon, who was watching him from the pilot's seat.