The moment of reckoning—in twelve minutes!
Meanwhile Charleston's spaceyacht was following the destroyer down the strange layer of wild winds in Venus' stratosphere. Some time before he had reached out a pudgy hand to turn on his infrared view-plates and the destroyer stood out sharply on the visual grid.
"Damn it!" the fat millionaire was thinking, "no state of war exists. Why should that Martian blast the patrol ship and tear away my broadcast antenna with a torp?"
The air was extremely rough. The yacht pitched and yawed, and with the pitching and yawing Charleston found his daughter Ginny at his side.
"Pater, what is wrong?" she queried in a post-deb voice.
"There's a des—" Jimmie started.
"Harrrrumph!" Charleston burst.
Jimmie was squelched.
"Just following another ship down which acts kind of peculiarly," explained the millionaire. "Wish I could report him to the Authority. Can't, though, a—er—meteor tore away the antenna!"
"Why are you swerving your course?" Unquestionably Ginny knew her rocketships.