One of the workmen from the smelting plant, a tall black-haired fellow wearing tinted glasses, stood looking into the office. Mart didn't remember ever seeing him before—but with several hundred workmen, you couldn't remember all of them.
"Director Barrow in?"
Mart glanced up at the wall clock before he answered. "He'll be here in twenty-one minutes. Sit down and wait if you're off duty."
He turned back to the papers and finished initialing them, grinning inwardly at being able to say that the Director would arrive in twenty-one minutes exactly. It wasn't everywhere that one could make so accurate a prediction about anyone's arrival time, but Barrow was something of a chronometer himself.
He tossed the papers toward the back of the desk and threw the switch of the communicator on his desk, leaned forward slightly. "Dispatcher Wells calling Police Autogiro."
"Autogiro, Captain Wayne," came the reply. "Go ahead. Mart."
"I was the one who reported seeing the spaceship, Cap—if it was one. Found it? If not, I can—"
"Thanks, Mart, but we've sighted it all right. We're now circling, looking for a spot to come down. It doesn't take much, but damned if we can perch on a ridge like a canary. Neither could that space-speedster down there.
"Wrecked? What's it look like?"