"There are no 'buts' about it. I have made a study of the need for agricultural minerals on Mars. If handled properly, the thing is richer than forty mints. I intend to see that it is handled properly. You could have made a fortune here, if you'd a had good sense." An accusatory note crept into the voice as if the failure to make a fortune when one was to be had was an act that Roy Larkin could neither understand nor forgive.
Boyd Larkin felt a burning inside of him, replacing the gladness he had felt when first he saw this man. There had been no change. There was no possibility of change. "You seem to know quite a lot about Mars."
"I do," Roy Larkin grinned. "I've made a study of the subject. A couple of articles you wrote gave me the idea that the right man could clean up here. Of course, I didn't think that you were the man—"
"There may be difficulties," the father said.
"We expect them. So what?" Roy Larkin gestured at the men with him, a gesture which also included the Kell guns they carried and which included the Kell gun held in the elbow of his left arm. "If these don't do the job, we've got bigger things on the ship."
"I see," Boyd Larkin said. He was regaining some of his lost composure but he was acquiring no liking for the situation.
"We're not looking for trouble but we came prepared for it. I thought you would be a big enough fool to tell us to go to hell if you had the chance. Well, you've got the chance but you either throw in with us or we throw you out—bodily." His manner said he was prepared to back up his words.
Larkin was silent. They could remove him bodily from this place. He could not resist four men. "But what if the Martians refuse to trade with you when you take over?" he said quietly.
"How can they refuse? They've got to have minerals. Without them, they starve."