Biggs frowned. "Latin?" he hazarded.
"Pig-Latin," I told him, "and horse-sense. Hanson says you've been wearing it on the sleeve for his gal, Diane. And if he sees it pounding in the open once more, he's going to chop it into mincemeat."
Biggs' face looked like a national holiday on the calendar. He strangled gently.
"But—but I like the girl, Sparks. And I believe she likes me."
"She'll revere your memory," I told him frankly, "if you don't obey the Old Man's orders. When he issued his manifesto he had granite in his jaw and mayhem in his eyes. You'd better do as he says."
"But it's not fair!" protested Biggs. "After all, I'm an officer and a—"
"And a gentleman," I finished wearily, "by courtesy of the U.S.S.A. Yeah, I know. But in my estimation, that's just strike two against you. The skipper doesn't have a lot of use for you graduate Wranglers, you know. He graduated from the N.R.I. before there was such a thing as an Academy."
Perhaps, for the sake of you Earth-lubbers who are tuned in I should explain this. The rivalry between Earth's two great schools of astronavigation is something paralleled only by that which existed, centuries ago, between the United States' two military schools, the U.S.M.A. and the U.S.N.A.
The National Rocket Institute is the older college for spacemen. Originally designed for merchant marine training, it became a natural "friendly foe" of the United States Spaceways Academy when that institution was founded fourteen years later.