"I can handle one like this with ease. I have fast reflexes and quick nerve response."
"It'll take some time before you get all that there is in it out of it," grinned the mechanic. "Mind signing an affidavit to the effect that we are not to be held responsible for anything that happens with the souping-up?"
"Not at all."
The mechanic went at the job with interest. His estimate was good, and within two hours the flier was standing on the runway, all ready to go. Cal returned from a shopping trip about this time and packed his bundles into the baggage compartment. He paid off, and then took off at high speed and headed south.
Eight hours later the fog bank that marked the Vilanortis Country came before the nose of Cal's flier. He plunged into the fog at half speed and continued on for a full five hundred miles.
He was about halfway through the vast fog bank when he landed and started to install the Key-equipment for operation. The job took him a full day, and he slept on the divan in the cabin of the flier that night. He could have used the flier at night, for there was no choice between night-operation and the thickness of the eternal fog of the Vilanortis Country. In neither case could he see more than a few yards ahead.
And while Cal slept, Benj dropped his flier on the edge of the fog country and waited. The detectors were installed and operating, and the black flier was all ready to surge forward on the trail as soon as Cal's initial signal went forth. Having had more experience in this sort of thing, Benj knew how to go about it. He'd not follow the trail of Cal's signal, but would turn and follow the answering, sympathetic oscillation from the resonant cavity at Murdoch's Hoard. And with that same experience, Benj knew that he could beat Cal to the spot, and possibly be gone with Murdoch's Hoard before Cal got there. He composed a sarcastic sign to leave on the spot for Cal to find. That, he liked. Not only would he have Murdoch's Hoard, but he would be needling his hated brother too.
Tinker had curbed her tongue. What was going to happen she did not know. Benj was quite intent on the mechanics of the chase and hadn't paid too much attention to her except to see that she was completely held. The idea of her, a sentient identity, being restrained with heavy handcuffs made her rage inwardly. Yet she kept her peace. She was not going to attract Benj's attention to her.
So she dozed on the divan in Benj's flier while Benj cat-napped at the wheel of the flier. He would be up and going at the first wink of the pilot light and the first thrumming whistle that came from the detector. He wanted to waste no time. Running down a source of transmitted signal was a matter of a few hours at most, even though it were halfway around the planet. He chuckled from time to time. He'd had Wally tailing Cal, and had a complete report on the flier and its souping-up. His own flier was capable of quite a few more miles per hour than Cal's, and Benj was well used to his.