"You touch me deeply, John!" my father observed dryly. "As sanctimonious as ever! Pure, honest John Gibson! Ceres' outstanding citizen!" He surged to his feet, leaned across the desk; for the second time that night his cold, mocking mask dropped, revealing the man beneath. Eyes like glowing coals, face etched in savage lines, he stared at my uncle. "I've thought of you a great deal these eleven years! In the radium fields of that hell-planet Mercury, hunting gold in the stinking Venusian jungles, prospecting the dusty, choking deserts of Mars! And there was one thing that kept me going! The thought of this minute! A year ago I'd scraped together enough to buy the little space-yacht outside. Then I had to go to Terra, find Clare...." He motioned toward the girl.
Uncle John swung about, noticing the girl for the first time as she stepped from the shadows. His face took on a drawn, tight look.
"Who is this girl?" he croaked.
"Allow me." My father waved an airy hand. "Miss Clare Conroy, daughter of the late Carl Conroy."
"Daughter of...! But I didn't know he had a daughter! Why is she here?" Uncle John whirled about. "What deviltry is this? You, the murderer of her father, kidnaping the daughter...."
"Not kidnaping, Mr. Gibson," Clare said quietly. "I came of my own free will."
I gasped. This girl, Conroy's daughter! And she'd come with the man who had killed her father, to the scene of the crime, was aiding him in stealing the palladium. I felt as though I were living some mad nightmare.
My father, on the other hand, seemed to be enjoying himself hugely. He stumped out his eyla, smiled ironically across the desk.
"You see," he said, "Clare has faith in me. She believes that after her father's death, and my own foolish flight, the partnership agreements were destroyed, leaving you, John, sole possessor of Cerean Mining. You didn't know Conroy had a daughter on earth. I was a fugitive who'd never dare go to court over my share, and Stephen knew nothing of the arrangement, and wouldn't have contested if he had. Thus Cerean Mining was yours."