CHAPTER I
Comrades of Peril
They sauntered through the crowded, krypton lit street bordering the great New York spaceport, casually, as though there was not a reward on their heads. An Earthman, a Venusian, and a huge Mercurian, looking merely like three ordinary space-sailors in their soiled, drab jackets and trousers.
But inwardly John Thorn, the lean, dark-headed Earthman of the trio, was queerly tense. He felt the warning of that sixth sense which tells of being watched. His brown, hard-chinned face showed nothing of what he felt, and he was smiling as though telling some joke as he spoke to his two companions.
"We're being followed,” he said. “I've felt it, since we left the spaceport. I don't know who it is."
Sual Av, the bald, bow-legged Venusian, laughed merrily as though at a jest. His bright green eyes glistened, and there was a wide grin on his ugly, froglike face.
"The police?” he chuckled.
Gunner Welk, the huge Mercurian, growled in his throat. His shock of yellow hair seemed to bristle on his head, his massive face and cold blue eyes hardening belligerently.
"How in hell's name would the Earth police spot us so quickly after our arrival?” he muttered.
"I don't think it's the police,” John Thorn said, his black eyes still smiling casually. “Stop at the next corner, and we'll see who passes us."