"Carlyle!" Larry could not restrain the angry syllables. "I don't like it, Ann! It's like a serpent's eye, or something. It looks so alive—"
Ann's eyes at last met his, and they were cold as space. "We won't argue about it," she said wearily.
Larry got up, striving against the hot resentment searing his heart. "You know I'm leaving now?"
"Yes. Good luck, Larry."
"Thanks!" Larry snorted, and strode from the room.
Larry's was the last scout to be dropped from the Friar Bacon. The mother ship was now piloted by Carlyle, who swung it back to the first salvage ship they had dropped.
For hours it was a matter of cruising this way and that, searching the sky for traces of wreckage. Bits of flotsam were everywhere, but large fragments were scarce indeed. Larry's heart was leaden, but he buried himself in the work and succeeded in half-forgetting his worries.
Lanky Jeff Adams was at the controls of the cramped little vessel when the first dark splinter was sighted in the void. Braced against the lurch and roll of the ship, Larry scrutinized the wrecked ship as they neared it. So unbelievable was the sight he saw that for an instant after he lowered the glasses it did not penetrate his reflexes. His fingers were tracing the vessel's name into the log when suddenly he stared at what he had written: "11:46 A. M. sighted derelict Astral. Good condition...."
Larry Wolfe dropped the glasses and let out a yell. Jeff leaped as though he had been stung, his magnificent red beak of a nose growing redder with the excitement. Abe Miller, stocky, beetle-browed helper, stared at the officer.