“She doesn’t know all of my plans. And she was willing to help me—as the price of your freedom. Listen!” Olcott spoke persuasively. “The girl’s already on the ship. She’s got her instructions. Tomorrow, at three P.M., she’ll smash the radio. If you’re not on hand to pick her up—and the radium—she’ll get into trouble. Destroying communications in space is a penal offense. She might go to Transpolar.”
Duncan snarled deep in his throat. His face was savage.
Olcott kept the gun steady. “Everything’s planned. Be smart, and in a couple of days you’ll be back on Earth, with Andrea and half a million credits. If you want to be a damned fool—” the pistol jutted—“it’s a long drop. And it’ll be tough on the girl.”
“Yeah,” Duncan whispered. “I get it.” His big fists clenched. “I’ll play it your way, Olcott. I have to. But if anything happens to Andrea, God help you!”
Olcott only smiled.
CHAPTER TWO
Invisible Pirate
Rudy Hartman was drunk. An overtured bottle of khlar, the fiery Martian brew, lay beside his cot, and he stumbled over it and cursed thickly as he blinked at tropical sunlight. The gross, shapeless body, clad in filthy singlet and dungarees, lumbered over to a crude laboratory bench, and Hartman, blinking and grunting, fumbled for a syringe. He shot thiamin chloride into his arm, and simultaneously heard the roar of a plane’s motor.
Hastily Hartman left the godown and headed for the island’s beach near by. The camouflaged amphibian was gliding across the lagoon—a quick flight, that had been, from the Polar Circle to the South Pacific! Hartman’s eyes focused blearily on the plane as it slid toward the rough dock.