"Your husband's death was not an accident," said Langsmith.
She gasped, and turned deathly pale.
"In the six months before this spaceship landed, there were some twenty-eight mysterious deaths," said Langsmith. "More than that, really, because innocent bystanders died, too. These accidents had a curious similarity: In each instance there was a fatality of a foremost expert in the field of language, cryptoanalysis, semantics....
"The people who might have solved this problem died before the problem was even presented," said Speidel. "Don't you think that's a curious coincidence."
She was unable to speak.
"In one instance there was a survivor," said Langsmith. "A British jet transport crashed off Ceylon, killing Dr. Ramphit U. The lone survivor, the co-pilot, said a brilliant beam of light came from the sky overhead and sliced off the port wing. Then it cut the cabin in half!"
Francine put a hand to her throat. Langsmith's cautious hand movements suddenly fascinated her.
"Twenty-eight air crashes?" she whispered.
"No. Two were auto crashes." Langsmith puffed a cloud of smoke before his face.